The World is Changing
by tropicalsplash.juicyfruit
Summary: It's Renesmee Cullen's first time at school. One thing leads to another, and the world explodes with new friendships, love, loss, and hate. *From 2 viewpoints: Renesmee Cullen/Jane Asher - new characters. Please read and review - NO CHEATING!*
1. Chapter 1

It is Renesmee Cullen's first time at school – grade 11 – and Edward 'Masen' and Bella 'Dwyer' are with her. It's all normal; she meets teachers and classmates, et cetera.

It is Jane Asher's thirteenth first time at school.

Jane Asher is _in no way_ related to Jane from the Volturi. In real life, she was Paul McCartney's girlfriend. In here, she's the center of many jokes related to that – just a normal person. Sorry.

I don't own Twilight or Barney, or the name McCartney, which is quite funny, because their Art and Music teacher's surnames are McCartney. They're sisters. Phail.

Thanks to all of you who put up with my crap – on FanFiction, and away from the computer. You don't know where I am. HAHAHA! Please read and review this story. I'm sorry you wasted your time reading all this. Thanks, and enjoy.

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_**Renesmee**_

I looked at the clock but didn't see the time. Absently, I tapped the excess graphite from the page I was working on and signed the bottom. I looked around to see that I was the only student finished the poster. As silently as possible, I pushed my chair out and walked to the teacher's desk. Eyes followed me the way there, and lingered where I stood.

"Miss McCartney?" I whispered. The teacher looked up from her book, startled. "I'm finished."

Miss McCartney was a small, thin woman, with brown hair and eyes, and a nice smile. She liked to tell us about herself, and on the first day the whole class knew where she lived, how old she was, and where she was born. Right now, she looked at me as if I were a magical being. Which I was.

"You have four more days to complete the project," she said dazedly, but I handed her my poster anyway.

"I didn't want to put colour in it; it would've looked strange," I said, as if apologizing. "I could redo it…"

"It's beautiful!" she gasped, letting the bright lights fall on it.

I wouldn't admit how the idea came to my mind – I actually couldn't think of a subject, my mind was stuck on last night's hunt. There was a perfect scene where Jacob ran along the river under the full moon, and the next thing I knew, it was on the paper.

"What would you call it?" Miss McCartney asked, snapping me back to the present. I put my hands down on her desk, and Jacob's bracelet slid down to my hand. As usual, I thought about our imprinter-imprintee relationship, and how he would support me in every non-romantic way.

"I can't put it into words," I replied. _No, really, I can't._

Miss McCartney nodded in agreement. She pulled a purple Post-It from the pad stuck to the desk and wrote a big "5" on it, sticking it to the back of the page. She handed it back to me and said, "You can go, if you'd like."

I smiled. "Thanks, Miss M." I gathered my tools and placed them in my bag, still holding my poster of Jake. I picked up the sling bag and set it on my right shoulder, leaving the room quietly.

I went straight outside to sit at one of the picnic tables. Nobody else was out yet, and it looked ready to rain – again. I found my phone and buds in a pocket inside my bag. _Thank you, Aunt Alice! _It was a tiny phone that any klutz would break in a second, but there wasn't a scratch on it. I pressed the play button and hummed with the songs. I took a blank poster out of my bag, and contemplated between oil pastels and pencil crayons. I decided against the messy pastels and started copying my grey-toned poster into colours.

"Russet?" I mumbled, pushing through the pencils. "No russet. Well, thank you, Crayola." I pulled out the closest colour and tested it on the inside of the box, heaving an irritated sigh. _Good enough._

I was finished in fifteen minutes – only because I was copying another picture of mine. Pleased with the day's work – but a little sad that Jacob was the wrong colour – I put both pictures in an empty folder. The last song in the list ended, and there was a weird silence around me. The tables started to fill with students being let out early or coming back from skipping classes.

I looked up, wanting to pay attention to _something_. There was one thing that spooked me – it almost felt like I saw the future. There was one guy I had seen a few times before – usually passing in the morning – leaning against the wall of one of the buildings, looking at nothing. His eyes were darker than his hair, and there was an air of thought around him.

He creeped me out. _Stop staring at me,_ I thought, looking down. I took a breath and looked up. I swore he looked right at me before he turned and walked into the cafeteria. I shuddered, feeling relatively stalked. Then again, _I_ was staring at _him_.

In minutes, all the benches were filled. One girl walked out of the school and frowned. She looked very familiar – I realized she was in my Art class, and her name was Jane. I thought she was very pretty – she had one blue streak and one red streak in the front of her brown hair, and her eyes were light green. I heard people call her Chuck, but I didn't know why.

Feeling guilty about having a whole bench to myself, I waved to her. She grinned, and I felt better. She ran to the bench and sat down beside me.

"Hello," I said pleasantly, looking for a brownish-black for Jacob's paws.

"Hi," she said. "Thanks for letting me sit here." I shrugged, smiling. "Would you mind if I asked you why you left Art twenty minutes early?"

Jane was smiling like the sun was shining all around the world. _Not here,_ I thought, letting out a half-laugh. "I finished my poster." I turned the grey poster around to face her, and her face lit up.

"Pretty," she commented. She looked at the coloured poster. "I'm not sure which one I like better. The coloured one makes it more... thoughtful, but the grey one looks more... wild. It looks so _real_. Which one do you like better?"

I looked at the posters thoughtfully. "Well... I have different reasons to change my mind. I like the grey one more because the coloured one has the wrong colours. Umm... the way I thought it should look is different from the way it looks on paper. I got screwed over by pencil crayons." Jane laughed and I realized what I just said. "That sounded weird, didn't it?"

Jane nodded, forcing herself to stop laughing. She started randomly braiding her blue streak. When she got to the bottom, she let it unwind. She moved on to the red streak. "It's not _that_ weird. I've said things much stranger than that." She looked at me seriously. "What do I call you? Renesmee or Ness?"

That threw me a little off guard. "I don't care. Whatever floats your boat. What am I supposed to call you? Jane or Almost-Mrs.-Paul-McCartney?"

She looked up at me, surprised. "Did I say my last name was Asher? I don't remember saying it...."

"You did. It was the first thing you said. 'Hi, my name is Jane Asher, no Paul McCartney jokes please.' The class looked at you like you were insane."

"They have to read more. I'm still waiting for them to get back together."

Jane nodded and looked to the sky. "Dear God, please send me Paul McCartney, or someone my age exactly like him, so that I may marry him, because I love him so. Amen. PS: I'm hungry." The bell rang as soon as she looked down. She smirked, and I gaped at her. "I looked at my watch," she said, pointing to the screen saver on my phone.

"Oh, fail," I said, turning it off. "I didn't realize it was still on. Sorry."

"S'okay." Jane turned to the doors, watching everybody walk inside. "I like outside more," she muttered, shaking her head. She looked at me in a friendly way. "I think we'll end up good friends. How 'bout you?"

"Less than a month," I agreed, and we shook hands.

I turned to the doors as I dropped the phone into my bag. _I'm not coming,_ I thought to Dad.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Jane**_

It was known as _the average _day. Renesmee and I were eating lunch and talking about random things that usually revolved around the sun. That was the way it worked for the first month of school.

This was the usual time when I turned to the doors to see who was coming outside. I had to do a triple-take to make sure the two people coming now were, for one, _real_, and that they were coming right towards our bench.

I felt myself redden slightly as the guy sat down across from me. These two were abnormally beautiful. The guy had red-brown hair and the girl had hair that was brown like mine, but nicer. They both had gold-ish coloured eyes. I choked on air when I saw that Renesmee looked like both of them put together. Except her hair was curly, and her eyes were brown.

_Holy crap,_ I thought. "Umm, hi," I mumbled, looking at the table. All those years of building up my confidence had shattered in less than a second thanks to those two. _Holy crap,_ I thought again.

The guy laughed quietly. Renesmee nudged me, and I looked up. "Jane Asher – Bella Dwyer, Edward Masen. Vice versa, and I am Renesmee Cullen." She grinned to herself, and I had to find that a little bit funny. I smiled, unable to be as happy as I normally was. Bella looked pointedly at Edward. I shook my head. _Don't say it. Don't say it. Don't –_

"Are you married to Paul McCartney?" Edward asked, trying not to laugh but failing.

My hands flew to my forehead. "I hate my name!" I gasped. I looked at him. "No, I am not married to Paul McCartney."

"Not yet," Bella said.

I had to smile at that. "No, not yet," I agreed. Unconsciously, I started humming _I Feel Fine_ and tapping the tricky beat on the table.

"I think John sings that one," Renesmee said.

"It's the point of the song," Edward pointed out. He looked at me, and I nodded. He turned back to Renesmee. "At least Paul McCartney is still alive. Your favourite Beatle was the first to die. Maybe you should tell Jacob you're going for a dead John Lennon."

Renesmee smirked and shook her head. "There are a few problems there. One – Bitch is still alive. Two – no, there's just that one problem."

"There's still Julian," I suggested. "I'm assuming Bitch is Yoko Ono?" Renesmee nodded. "Hmm... not to change the subject, but how do you three know each other? I've been here my whole life and I've never met you two." I lightly pointed to Edward and Bella.

I was glad to feel my confidence growing again. It was easy to talk to these strange people when I was calm, and we had something in common. I said that just to make conversation – and because it's nice to know something about your acquaintances.

"Umm," Renesmee said. She looked to Edward and Bella for something to say. I frowned, suddenly becoming suspicious of these three who looked so much alike. _That is SO not you,_ my little Voice of Reason yelled. _Don't be a bee-otch._

"Renesmee and I are related," Edward told me. "Distantly, but we're related. I moved in with her family a while ago. We're cousins, of sorts."

Bella thought about her answer. She looked to Edward, who smirked. "I moved here in July," she said simply.

I took out my phone and pretended to look at the time. "I have to go," I said, not bothering to think of a reason why. "See you later." I picked up my bag and rushed away, feeling myself go pale.

_Holy crap,_ I thought for the third time, _these people are abnormal._

As if I had a sixth sense, I could almost feel irritation in the people I had just ditched, or a small and ignored feeling of rejection that they seemed to be accustomed to. I walked it off, hoping to buy something before I had to go back to class.

When I reached the cafeteria – it seemed like it took forever – I immediately walked to the short line and contemplated. I chose what I wanted to eat and wondered what was with those people. It was strange, but it seemed like one – or all – of them could read my mind. Maybe I was just predictable.

"What can I get you, Mrs. McCartney?" the lady behind the counter said. I looked up, annoyed.

"Oh, hi, Rico," I muttered to my way-older cousin. We looked exactly alike, except her hair was golden blonde. People said it was the identical green eyes that told them we were cousins.

"It's Mary today," she said. "What do you want?"

"I want a chicken burger, _Poppy_."

Poppy (Mary) opened the rotating-pizza-thing and took a big burger off the top rack. "Two bucks, _Mrs. McCartney_."

I stuck my tongue out at her and put the money down, walking to the table where my two other friends were situated.

"And here she comes, Paul's wife!" Thing One said.

"Be glad she's not John's wife!" Thing Two added.

"Shut up," I said, sitting down. "At least I'm not named from a Dr. Seuss."

Thing One and Thing Two were twin sisters. They both had curly black hair, and the only difference between them and their bright blue eyes was the fact that Thing One (Ashlyn) grew her hair to her back, and Thing Two (Kiera) kept hers to her shoulders.

Thing One pushed her hair away from her eyes – something she had to do every time she turned her head. "I heard from a very reliable source that you were hanging out with Cullen," she said. "What do you want with her, anyway?"

I glared at her. "She's nice. You people must be out of your minds if you think she's that rude and spoiled. Those two people she's with though – Bella Dwyer and Edward Masen – there's something about _them_."

"But she _is_," Thing Two said quietly. "And that Edward guy is shifty. I swear, he's cheating on Bella – with Renesmee. I saw them together this morning."

I snorted. "Edward and Renesmee are cousins, Kiera."

She looked at me blankly. "Oh," she said. "Well."

"Yeah, _well_ is an understatement." I looked at my hands and remembered the chicken burger I intended to eat. I unwrapped it and bit into it. Things One and Two always thought it was weird that I ate it plain, but I thought it was better this way.

"You have the _crêpe_," Thing Two whispered to me, and I wondered if she was right.

The _crêpe_ was a "disorder" that we related to suspicion. Whenever anyone wondered what somebody was doing, we identified it as the _crêpe_.

_Oh my Paul,_ I thought. _For the first time ever… I have the _crêpe_._


	3. Chapter 3

_**Renesmee**_

I looked pointedly at Mom and Dad, wondering why Jane had up and left. Mom looked like this reminded her of something depressing – she looked relatively sad, and I didn't like it. Dad looked surprised, probably at Jane's thoughts. There was an annoying silence out here, so I decided to break it by slamming my fist on the edge of the table. A huge chunk of wood bounced off the bench and fell to the ground with a wet _thump_.

"Woops," I muttered, wiping splinters off my hand. "That was supposed to mean 'say something' but it failed. So, what's the deal?"

Mom smiled again, and I smiled too. Dad looked at me and said, "She's smart. She already thinks we're 'abnormal'. I think it's much better than being called a freak, but she's already trying to figure it out."

I nodded slowly. "She seems very... intense about her thoughts, doesn't she? Almost like she's solved a Rubik's Cube in every way possible."

Mom's smile got big, and I wondered what she was thinking. So did Dad, because he looked at her the way he did when she did something weird that everyone wondered about.

"What?" I said. "Mom, you know you have to tell us everything."

She shook her head. "Just the idea of a Rubik's Cube is funny. I used to think solving one was throwing it at the wall and watching twenty-six pieces flying so I could put it back together fixed."

I frowned at her. "That's really sad, Mom. I bet now you could solve one in record time. But of course not, because you have much better things to do."

It took a second for her to get the joke, but Dad understood it right away. He pointed at me and spoke seriously. "You will _not_ end up like Emmett." I knew he was joking, but he was actually annoyed with Emmett and his constant innuendos. "Hey. Step away from that."

I shrugged. "Whose fault is it?" I asked, staring him down. He glared back teasingly. After a long staring contest, he nodded to Mom and laughed.

"That's not funny," Mom growled. "Can I kill him yet?"

Dad pretended to think about it. "It would be a bad idea. If we get Emmett, Rosalie will attack us, and it will start a cataclysmic chain reaction that will blow us to smithereens."

"Not yet," Mom translated. "There's a lot of that going around, isn't there?"

I nodded, unsure of why I was still sitting here. I loved my parents a lot, but it was hard to see them as _parents_ when they were seventeen and eighteen and I was physically older than they were. Only by a year or two, but still. The really messed up part was that I was only six years old biologically. My growing was so slow now that vampires and wolves could only notice it if they paid close attention.

"I really hope we survive the apocalypse," I said unconsciously. "December twenty-first is coming quickly...."

"You're crazy," Mom joked, but I could tell she thought about it, too. Trying to change the subject, she looked at my still-open bag. "What have you done today?"

"Oh. Umm..." I retrieved the neon green folder I put the posters in so long ago. I never really thought about them.... The folder was a little transparent, so I didn't have to take the poster out for Mom to see the pictures. I did anyway, putting the grey and coloured pictures on the table.

Dad looked at them and rolled his eyes. Mom gave him a snappy look and he smiled. "Nice pictures, Ness," he said. "How much of the hunt did you put on paper?"

"Just that," I said, a little embarrassed. "It's from a while back, though."

Mom looked at them closely. She looked at me. "Nicely done," she said. She flipped to the coloured one. "Are you going to colour the negative space in this one, or no?"

I shook my head and Mom handed the posters to Dad. He looked at both of them and gave them back to me. I put them back into the folder and put the folder in my bag. This time I closed the backpack.

"Which one do you like better?" I asked.

"The grey one," Mom said. "There's no problem in that one – the coloured one isn't toned right."

"That's what Ness said," Dad told her. "But, yes, the grey one, until I can find the right colours for you."

I grinned and tapped on the table. "It's sad when you have the biggest possible pack of colours and you _still_ can't get the right one. But, then again, you can't expect everything to be the same in different dimensions."

Mom nodded and Dad said, "Time to go – unless you want to be late for _music_." He said it sarcastically, like he didn't particularly want to go to this class, but admitting he had to. "Purgatory," he muttered.

We stood up at the same time and began walking to where the music class was. I pretty much followed Dad, which was normal.

It was, most obviously, one of the newer buildings. There was a big "9" painted on the wall and a little sign underneath the number that said MUSIC. Suddenly, I was glad there was only one period after lunch.

"You're very negative, for your first time at school," Dad said, opening the door for me and Mom. We walked in, and the door closed quietly behind Dad.

"It's the clouds," I explained. "It's so _dark_. At least, it's dark outside...."

The room slash building was bigger than I thought, and the ceiling was lined with lights. The metal instruments would reflect the light haphazardly. There were six students randomly dispersed around the room, either looking for books or reading some of the corny posters all over the place. We walked up to the teacher and she checked our names off.

"I'm Miss McCartney," the teacher said. "My sister teaches second and third period Art, and I teach third and fifth Music – obviously. You should remember me by now. Let's see... Edward, you're on piano, so go...." She pointed to a grand piano cleverly placed at the far end of the room. "Miss Bella, you're second clarinet. You've moved up one. Yay." She pointed to the second row of seats. Dad nudged Mom and laughed. She poked him, and he stopped. "Renesmee, you're now first flute, next to Jane."

"Jane?" I said, looking at the first row of seats. In the second seat on the left – I wasn't sure how I missed someone sitting by the door – sat Jane, putting her flute together.

_That's not good,_ I thought, seeing how tense she was, and how she pretended not to hear Miss McCartney.

I walked to my seat slowly, suddenly feeling a huge crack in the ground where our friendship used to be.


	4. Chapter 4

_**Jane**_

Renesmee came to sit beside me, walking slowly, almost as if I were some dangerous animal she was afraid to approach. Even _that_ was strange enough to trigger more suspicions in me, and I wondered what her game was.

_My god, you really _are _a bitch,_ Voice of Reason yelled.

In a tight movement that seemed a little too rough, I retrieved the cleaner from the stand in front of me and stuffed it in the flute's case. Trying to clear my head, I flipped to the first page of the purple book on the stand and started practicing my scales.

The bell rang, and about twenty students rushed in the doors beside Renesmee. "Ugh," I muttered around the flute, realizing I would be very annoyed sitting so close to the doors.

"Shouldn't we start on the other side?" Renesmee mumbled to herself, looking from the doors to the last chair on the other side of the room. I shook my head. "All right, then...." Like a total pro, she cleaned her flute and put it together, opening her own book. She went straight to E and fixed the tone. When she got it right, she did her scales.

I didn't like to be outdone. It was okay for someone to be better than me – I had no problem with that – but if you got to the point where I thought you were showing off, I broke. That point was right here, beside my right foot. _If this goes one millimetre farther, I'm going to snap,_ I thought, seeing a microscopic red line very close to me.

There was a sound like a gavel at the front of the room, and the whole class went quiet. Miss McCartney was standing straight, looking around the room with a piece of chalk in her hand. "Good afternoon, suckers," she said jokingly. "I already told you who I am, but for you who don't listen well, _I am Miss McCartney_. Does anyone know the alphabet?"

Hands went up randomly around the room. I noticed that none of my three suspects were paying very close attention. Miss McCartney pointed to a guy in the middle of the room who looked relatively cocky and stupid.

"A, B, C, D, E, F, G," he sang, "H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, and Z." He sat back, obviously proud of his idiocy.

Miss McCartney smiled at him, and he looked pleased at the positive response. In a quick second, though, Miss M's smile was gone, and she threw the chalk at him.

"Anyone else, who is here to learn and _not_ to be 'cool'? I've already kicked you out twice before!" she yelled seriously. She looked way out, to the farthest student from the front. "Edward. Do _you_ know the alphabet?"

The whole class turned to see who was sitting at the piano. Edward grinned, and said, "Yes."

The class mechanically turned back to see Miss M's reaction.

"_That_ was the right answer," she said. "Can you tell me what the alphabet is?"

"Yes," Edward replied simply. Some students snickered, and Miss M smiled.

"Right again, Edward. What is the alphabet?"

"A-B-C-D-E-F-G, A."

Miss McCartney gave a single clap, and the class watched her intently. "In this class, there are not twenty-six letters in the alphabet. There are only seven. A through G. Anything between H and Z is not music." She turned to the blackboard behind her and got a new piece of chalk from a box on the ledge. "_Practice_," she said, writing the word and underlining it three times. "If you don't practice, you will fail. This day's class is dedicated to practice. Knock yourselves out, figuratively. Not literally, because I refuse to be responsible for twits. Thank you." She sat down behind her desk, and the class began working on different songs, terrified of what the teacher would do if they didn't.

"Serves them right," Renesmee said, mirroring my thoughts. "It's good to have some discipline in a music class. This is going to be a lot of fun."

I had to agree there.

__________

The class flew by in what seemed like a matter of minutes. Before I knew it, Miss McCartney was telling us to pack up and get out. I did that quickly, wanting nothing more than to be away from R, B, and E – I found it easier to refer to them by letters, instead of wasting a second or two on the whole name.

I was the first out of the class, followed quickly by R, E, and B. I walked swiftly to my car, a cute yellow Smartcar parked close, away from the beastly giants, but surrounded by average-sized vehicles.

As I fiddled with the key, I heard a commotion from a few spaces down. Not thinking, I stuck my head out and saw something that may just have created hatred.

Ness was leaning against her new purple VW Beetle, surrounded by boys. That wouldn't have bothered me, except she ignored all of them, except David. _Roar,_ I thought angrily, walking towards the crowd.

David North was the only nice guy in the whole _town_. He was almost an optimist – and I said that because he saw the positive in everything, but he also knew what people meant by _get real_.

He was average. It was the only thing to describe him. He was pretty much normal-looking, with dark brown hair that was relatively neat and brown eyes that were big and happy. Nobody liked him because of his looks – everybody liked him because he was a good friend.

I fell in the middle. I thought he was cute and friendly, and he would eventually be mine. _Eventually,_ I thought, with a half-laugh. _He's my equivalent of Paul McCartney!_ I sighed, pushing my way through the pack of idiots.

"Hey, Jane," all the guys said, and I went red with irritation.

Renesmee laughed at something David said, and he turned to me. "Got a reputation, Ash?" I really hated it when he used that nickname, but I had to admit, it was _way_ better then Chuck.

I shrugged. "I'm known for unknown reasons, David." I looked at Renesmee. "Would you mind if I stole these people?"

She smiled. "No, go ahead. I've got to go, anyway." She gave a single, small wave that looked for like a nonchalant flick. "Bye, people." She got into her Beetle quickly and manoeuvred out of the parking space with skill. "Bye, Jane!" she called behind her.


	5. Chapter 5

_**Renesmee**_

_Thank you, Jane!_ I thought as drove home, obeying the speed limit, unlike Mom and Dad. Those guys back there were starting to bug me. Well, no. I could ignore them, but with some difficulty. There was only one guy who wasn't trying corny pick-up lines. When that one guy said something about "counting shoulders" I had punched him in the face, which started more stuff from the other guys.

And that one guy – Jane said his name was David – was the only person who asked questions I would answer.

_That's a really bright colour. Did you get it custom painted?_

_Yep, the only purple they had was dark and bland. I like bright._

_Did anyone tell you to put green spots on it?_

_No.... Why?_

_So they could call it a Barney-mobile._

_What the hell is Barney?_

And the conversation continued until Jane came and freed me from the crowd. And now, I was safely away from them, driving down the highway.

I turned down the dirt road a little while later, only to stomp on the brake.

"_Jacob_!" I screeched, slightly irritated. The big wolf sat in the middle of the road, wagging his tail and smiling in a wolfy way. "Get out of my way, please," I said calmly, knowing he could hear me inside the car. He shook his head. "I'm _not_ hurting the car. I won't like hurting you, but you heal for free." He shook his wolf head again and walked even closer to the car. I revved the engine playfully, and he jumped back.

Tail still wagging, he turned around and ran down the road. _Hmm,_ I thought, following at a safe speed. Jacob ran into the forest, and I kept driving.

When I finally got to the house, I parked out front and got out, closing the door nicely. I locked it protectively, even though I didn't have to worry about anyone coming to steal it. Except Alice. Maybe.

"Do you want to get run over?" I said as Jacob ran out of the forest on two feet beside me. I met him halfway and jumped on him – I learned the easy way that being a foot and a half shorter than him was difficult for hugging. He slung me over his shoulder and I bounced into the house with my backpack falling down.

"I would prefer it if you didn't run me over," he said, flipping me onto the couch and sitting beside me. "How was your amazing day of school? I bet it sucked. Starting in grade eleven.... It's weird."

"It's not weird," I said. "I was greatly entertained today." I looked around, realizing it was too quiet. I touched Jacob's hand and thought, _Where is everybody?_

He looked around, as if he hadn't noticed the absence. He probably didn't. "Hey!" he said, and I realized I was still touching his hand.

_Woops,_ I thought, crossing my hands behind my back. "Well, where _are_ they?"

He shrugged. "I'm not allowed to tell you. They went somewhere to do something."

"No, _really_?" I rolled my eyes. "That's fine. I have nothing to do." I picked up my bag from where it fell beside the couch and pulled out the green folder.

"What's that about?" Jacob said, leaning over to see it better. Like a good Wolfgirl, I pulled out the pictures.

"Art project," I stated, giving them to him. "I was done before some people started. I couldn't think of anything 'artistic' enough, and the hunt popped into my head, and it was down before I realized I picked up the pencil. I may or may not have had them there for a month."

Jacob laughed and handed them back. "I like the grey one better. I'm the wrong colour in the other one. At least this one's supposed to be off."

I smiled and turned to lie down. Jacob grabbed my feet so I couldn't sit up again. Not that I wanted to – I was pretty comfortable.

"Good," he said, hearing what I just thought. "I think that's as good as it gets."

_Projecting from my feet or being comfortable?_

"Both."

I closed my eyes. It was quiet for a while – apart from our breathing – and I almost fell asleep. _Almost_. I suddenly heard people arguing a short ways away. I didn't pay attention to who it was or what they were saying. They were _arguing_, and that was the one thing I really hated and feared. I was always terrified of an argument turning into something worse, even though I was always told to ignore it. We all knew _that_ was impossible. My eyes were shut tight, and I wouldn't open them until it stopped.

Jacob shook my feet, and I shook my head. "Ness, you _have_ to get up," he said sternly. His tone worried me more, so I opened my eyes. I looked to the door, because I could hear more than one set of feet climbing the stairs. I swung my legs down and ran to the door. I yanked it open just as they climbed the last step.

"We have a problem," Dad said angrily, pushing Jane towards me and pointing at her. "She followed you home and intended to attack you. Could you tell us _why_?"

I gaped at him. He looked at Jane pointedly, and I glared at her. "Why did you follow me home?" I asked her calmly. "I know you're my friend, but you have no right to stalk me."

"I didn't," she said, flinching at her lie. I crossed my arms, and her eyes grew wide. She looked like a mess, but I was immediately angry.

"This won't help!" Alice exclaimed from the road. She ran up the stairs at a human pace and grabbed Jane's arm lightly. Jane squeaked in fear. Alice led her inside and situated her at the dining room table, disappearing into the kitchen. I followed right behind them and Dad behind me. Mom walked in and explained everything to Jacob, telling him to stay in there.

Alice came back with a gigantic chocolate bar I somehow overlooked and dropped it in front of Jane. She just stared at it, afraid of what to do.

"Why did you follow me home?" I repeated, sitting beside her. Dad sat on Jane's other side, and she cringed. "Holy crap Dad, what did you _do_ to her?"

"Dad?" Jane whispered, looking at us. I smacked my forehead at my stupidity, and Jane's eyes narrowed. "What _are_ you?" she said dangerously.


	6. Chapter 6

_**Jane**_

I sat at the big glass table, surrounded by weird people, feeling a combination of mistrust, terror, fear, and fury. Edward had mysteriously jumped out in front of me and nearly broken both my arms when I tried to run away. Now I knew running from him was a bad idea. _Maybe I should think of them as things...._

"No kidding," Edward muttered, almost silently. "And we are _people_, not _things_," he said, louder.

"_Thing_," I spat. "_Freak_." The little one came around and slapped me across the face. It hurt a lot, and I almost screamed. I held myself together, though, and continued my rampage. "_This_ is why I followed you home," I hissed at Renesmee. "To see what the deal was. I'm starting to think you're not normal."

"No crap, Sherlock," Renesmee replied calmly. "What do you want?"

"What do you think I want?" I yelled. I smacked the table with the palm of my hand, and it made a loud noise. "I want _answers_. _Now_!"

"You're not getting any until you speak nicely," the little one said from behind me. "Trust me, _I know_."

_No one asked you, shrimpy,_ I thought angrily.

"I doubt she'll be so 'shrimpy' when you see her angry," Edward said.

"Get out of my head," I growled, putting my feet on the chair and crossing my arms around my legs. "Answers."

"What answers?" Renesmee asked.

I glowered at Edward. "Why did she call you 'Dad'? And what about Bella?"

"I'm her father," he replied angrily. "Bella is her mother."

"What's the deal?" I asked Renesmee. "You're their age."

Renesmee shook her head. "I'm six."

I snorted. "And you're insane. You wouldn't be four feet tall if you were six. You're adopted, then."

"She _is_ six," the little one said. "And she's not adopted. Bella is twenty-five, and Edward is a hundred and eleven. So am I."

_All of you are crazy,_ I thought at Edward. _If you're actually that old, what are you, huh? And what's with the Indian?_

Edward rolled his eyes. "Bella, Jacob, could you come here?" he said in normal tones. "Our _guest_ has some questions that need to be answered."

I scowled at him. I blinked, and Bella was sitting beside Edward. I jumped a little. The big guy came in and sat down beside Renesmee.

"Voice your question," Edward said.

I took a deep breath. "Who are you?" I muttered, assuming they could hear every word clearly. "How is it possible that you're physically eighteen, but _apparently_ older? And younger, too, I guess. Why are your eyes gold and why are you perfect? I don't really care about the mind-reading."

A door slammed in another room, and I was immediately calm. Everybody looked at the doorway, and my eyes followed.

"Jasper," the little one said, running to him and towing him to the table. "Stay here."

"Her name is Alice," Edward said casually, "not _the little one_."

"Get out of my head," I chimed, pushing the big piece of chocolate away from me. "I can't eat that, either. I'm allergic to cocoa. Can't eat more than one percent."

"I know," Alice said, ripping the thing open and exposing the white chocolate underneath. "But you won't eat it anyway, because you don't trust us. I get that. Now, I also see that we'll tell you the details in a while. But until then, you can answer some of our questions."

I shrugged. "Whatever. _I_, unlike some, have nothing to hide."

"Are you jealous of Renesmee?" she said, smirking.

I gave her the same evil look. "Nope. And I don't intend to be." I looked at Renesmee, hiding the deeper meaning from the mind-reader. He frowned, and I smiled. "How 'bout you, Ness? You jealous of me?"

She shook her head. "I also don't intend to be jealous of you. Why should I?" Her expression told me we were on the same page.

"No plans of revenge now," Alice said, tapping on the table. Who do you think _he_ is?" She nodded o the big Indian.

"Oh, thanks," he said. "So I'm not Jacob Black anymore. Just _he_. That's okay."

I looked at him and shrugged. "Family friend?" I guessed. "But I'll assume, since he's sitting so close to Renesmee, he's protective? She's got a promise bracelet on, so maybe they're dating?"

Alice clapped once, and she reminded me minutely of Music McCartney. "Close," she said. "Renesmee is the object of Jacob's imprinting. That means that he will always be there for Renesmee, no matter what she wants or needs. She wants him as a deep friend, and a good brother. That's all it ever will be, and Jacob has no problem with that."

I blinked, absorbing everything. I looked around the table, to Renesmee, Jacob, Alice, the guy named Jasper, Bella, and Edward. "You're supernatural," I concluded. I looked at Jacob again. "You're a Quileute wolf. Renesmee drew _you_!" I looked at Renesmee, and she nodded. "And you all... pale, fast, impossibly alive, strange eyes... Hmm. I'm getting nothing. And I doubt you'd tell me.... Just wait."

I held up one finger and went through my vocabulary of mythical creatures. _Obviously not werewolves.... Maybe shape-shifters...._ I went through everything I could think of. _Oh my god! Umm..._

"Holy crap," I realized, looking at them. "You're vampires. Holy crap."

I got another lone clap from Alice. "About time," she said, putting her hands on the table and looking at me directly. "Who's different?"

"You," I said immediately, but then I realized that wasn't the meaning of the question. I examined everyone's appearances and saw Renesmee's brown eyes. "You," I corrected. "Renesmee is different. But... crap."

"You say that a lot," Bella concluded.

"I know," I said unconsciously. "I can think of nothing better than witch. Unless you're some sort of hybrid."

All eyes were on me. Occasionally, someone would look at Renesmee – usually Jacob – and I would almost have the word. I shrugged, throwing my hands up in a gesture of _I have no idea_.

"Wait! Got it." _What am I getting myself into? This ridiculous mythical world that shouldn't exist? This is going too fast.... Half an hour to soak up all this stuff...._ "You're _half_. Human _and_ vampire."

She looked directly at me and nodded proudly. "I didn't expect this to happen in the first couple months of school.... Maybe the _last_."

_Holy crap,_ I thought. I stood up and tried to walk around the room. I took one step, then passed out cold.


	7. Chapter 7

_**Renesmee**_

"Catch her!" Alice shouted. Being the prophet, she was in front of Jane before we realized what she meant. Jane fell forward, and Alice caught her lightly. I stood up, shocked, and helped her being Jane carefully into the living room.

We set her on the couch, and I touched my forehead. "I should've known she would come. She looked so suspicious right away, and she was so direct.... I'm sorry, Aunt Alice. I just didn't think... I didn't think." I walked to the piano and sat down dismally. "I'm sorry," I said to no one in particular.

Alice sat down beside me and hugged me. "Even _I_ didn't see her coming. Not until she was on the drive. I guess she lives down the road a bit, and she followed you subconsciously. Maybe she saw the big-ass wolf and went to make sure you wouldn't get attacked. I don't know." She got up and sat behind the couch like she did when she was feeling guilty for no apparent reason.

When I felt bad, I came to this piano. I was never sure why I was pulled here. I just sat – I didn't play. Sometimes I would almost force myself to play, but I would be so upset that my fingers couldn't push on the keys. I didn't expect to play anything right now. My fingers fluttered over the keys uselessly, and I sighed. I put my hands down, but they seemed to resist the force I was giving to them. _Play!_ I commanded, but nothing happened. I took my hands away from the piano and placed them on my lap. I let the music flow through my mind instead, closing my eyes. It engulfed me, and I swayed.

It was real. I knew it was no longer in my mind. I wasn't sure if I was playing it, or if Dad had come over. No matter what was true, I listened happily. I felt my fingers twitch, and I opened my eyes. Dad was sitting beside me, playing the chaotic music that was in my head.

"Your idea is much more elaborate," he said. "Nearly impossible to play solo."

"Yeah," I mumbled, "well, I can't play it."

"Sure you can. I've seen you do it."

I shook my head and put my fingers on the keys. I tried to push them, but still nothing happened. It nearly made me cry. Dad stopped playing and randomly pushed my right thumb down. The heavy key rang, and it broke the tension.

"Much better," he said, starting again. I joined after the first bar, and I realized what I really needed was support. "Feel better yet?"

I shrugged, still playing modestly. "A bit. But it won't get everything out." Feeling annoyed, I slammed down on the keys with the _dun-dun-dun duuuuuuuuh_ from those horrible movies. "Yuck."

"Why yuck?" Alice asked from behind the couch. "She's not going to remember anything about us from before noon. What's with that?"

"When someone experiences great fear or great pain, their mind distorts the information to make it less traumatic," Dad said, probably reciting from a book he'd read. "She'll know us, and school, and that she came here. She'll probably think she came to visit. Most likely, she won't remember what happened from that time to when she wakes up."

Jane moaned and put her face in the pillow. She took a deep breath and she sat up, fully awake after a second. I always thought that was interesting about unconsciousness – even if you were tired before you passed out, you were awake when you woke up. Jane looked around, with a confused expression. When she saw me and Dad, she smiled.

"Hi," she said happily. "This _is_ your house, right, Ness?"

I shrugged. "More or less. I find myself living here for long periods of time." Dad poked me, and I laughed. "It's true!"

"Jane," Dad said, "do you know the relation between me and Renesmee?"

She shrugged. "I think I was told you're cousins. But you look more like brother and sister to me. You have different names, right?"

Dad and I exchanged a look, and I said, "Yes, we're cousins. He visits a lot."

"That's awesome," Jane said. "I wish my cousin visited.... He lives in freaking Canada. The last time I saw him, we were seven. People say we look alike. Hey, is Bella your cousin too?"

_This one's yours,_ I thought to Dad.

"Bella is my girlfriend," Dad said. Even I knew she hadn't been his girlfriend in more than six years. "I've known her for a few years."

Jane nodded thoughtfully. "She's pretty," she said. She looked at me. "You're pretty, too."

"Thank you, Jane," I said. "You are also pretty. Now, my thing is, do you think we're weird, in any way?"

She looked astounded at the question. "Of course not. Why would I think you're _weird_?"

"No problem with gold eyes?"

"I think they're beautiful."

Mom stuck her head out of the kitchen doorway. "Hi, Jane," she said. "Do your people know you're here? Just so they won't freak out and call the cops."

"Oh," Jane gasped, apparently just realizing she wasn't at home. "Umm, could I use the phone? I have to call my people." She smiled at the word, and stood up carefully. "Did I pass out?"

Alice stood up on the other side of the couch, making Jane jump. "You were doing too much at once and overexertion caught up."

Jane looked up thoughtfully and nodded. "That's me."

Mom came in and tossed Jane a cordless phone. Jane thanked her and dialled her number. I heard the phone ring a couple times, and then someone picked up.

"Hello," he said casually.

"Hi Dad," Jane said. "I'm at a friend's house. Umm... when do I have to be home?"

There was a short silence on the other line. "Soon, I think. Your mom says there's some kind of 'surprise' coming for you."

"Any details?" I had the feeling this was normal for Jane's mother.

"Not really," her dad said. "She said the surprise is a month older than you are...."

Jane's face went blank, and then lit up. "I'm coming." She pressed the button and handed Alice the phone. "I have to go," she rushed.

"Okay," I said, getting up. "See you tomorrow."

"Yep," Jane said, hugging me like we were good friends. Or like it was four hours ago. "Bye everyone!"

"Bye," they said in sync, and Jane smiled and left the house quickly.

As soon as her Smartcar was on the road, Alice jumped up, looking terrified. I turned to Dad, asking what was wrong.

"That's not good," he said flatly.


	8. Chapter 8

_**Jane**_

I crashed through the front door, knocking down pictures as it hit the wall loudly. There was nobody in the living room, so I ran right through to the sliding glass doors at the back. I could see my tree outside when I fell backwards with a pain in my face.

"Ow," I muttered. "Jeez!" I rubbed my forehead and opened the door. My dad was vinegar-ing the lawn for the fall, and the air smelled like mustard. Mom was standing under my tree. She turned to me and smiled.

"Door's closed," she said obviously. Her smile grew, and she fought back a laugh.

"Yeah, _well_," I said, looking around. "Surprise?"

She looked up, signalling that the "surprise" was in the tree. I looked into the leaves, but I couldn't see past the second layer.

"I think it flew away," Dad said, circling the tree with the watering can. "Let's bet it falls on its ass," he called louder.

There was a ghostly laugh from in the tree. A branch shook, scattering leaves on the three of us. Some of them were still green, but most of them were starting to yellow. I picked up a leaf and looked at it thoughtfully.

"Autumn always smells better than spring," I said. I noticed a big pile of leaves on the other side of the tree. "Who's up there?"

Mom shrugged and Dad jumped on a rogue dandelion. He dug it up carefully and ripped it apart, dropping it in the compost bin.

"I have found it funny," the faint voice said in the tree, "that there are no children named Spring."

Confused – _as usual,_ Dad always said jokingly – I stared at the tree. Suddenly, there was a big _poof_ and the leaves on the other side flew. I ran over and waited for someone to emerge.

He stuck his head out of the pile. I jumped back, seeing that he looked almost exactly like me. The bright green eyes were on Mom's side – they were unusually bright on him, like he was plotting to take over the world. There were leaves and a twig in his messy brown hair, and he grinned.

"Alex?" I said, puzzled.

He nodded and rolled out of the leaves skilfully. He stood up and shook the leaves away, totally ignoring the leaves in his hair. I sighed and quickly pulled them out. We were almost the same height last time I saw him – which was ten years ago – but now he was a few inches taller than me. He was tall and scrawny – a classic family trait – and he was dressed like an American would assume a Canadian would dress in mid-summer: jeans and a sweater. I made a mental note to steal the sweater, because it looked light and warm. And grey.

"I'm going to assume you're Jane Asher," he said, hugging me tightly. "Did you get Paul yet?"

"Shut up," I laughed. "How do you know I still love Paul McCartney? That _was_ ten years ago."

He laughed and sat in the pile of leaves. "You still haven't changed your name, and you still have that custom Beatles vs. Wings shirt."

"How do you know?" I asked, crossing my arms.

"You're wearing it."

Surprised, I looked at what I was wearing. The shirt was tacked up in my wall for the longest time, but now that it fit me, I wore it way too often. It wouldn't be new if I was wearing it today. Lo and behold, the green Apple logo was big and bright against the black right sleeve of the shirt, and the cover of _Abbey Road_ stuck out big and bright. Just to make sure, I strained to see my back, and the picture for _Band on the Run_.

"Oh," I said, looking at Alex. He smirked, and I sat down in the leaves beside him. "Mom, why did you let me wear this today?"

She peeked from the other side of the tree, still smiling. "You would subject to it anyway. People have been bugging you for years."

I gave her the look that meant _what?_ and shook my head. "Ridonculous. But I guess you're right. So, how long are you here?" I asked Alex. "Please tell me you're not moving in."

"Okay, I won't." He sat there silently, apparently thinking of something.

I laughed, and Dad came out from around the house, done with the vinegar for this year. He dropped the can in the box by the garden and walked over to the tree. "There's this place," he said, "between here and there. I like to call it _Vancouver_. It's a very wonderful place, I'm sure you've heard of it. See there are these _people_ who live there. They are widely known as the _Lemon_ family."

"We're not lemons," Mom scolded him. "We're Lennons. It is a known name that exists here and there, now and then. How do you think I feel, every time someone points out that my name is Cynthia? And you had to put that weight on Jane's shoulders, just to make a joke."

"It was a good joke," Alex said. "I like my name. There was no Alex Lennon back then."

I shrugged, deciding to change the subject before Dad made another epic joke. Instead of joking, he went inside to make supper. "So, I was at a friend's house," I said. "She's in my Art and Music classes, and I had lunch with her, her cousin, and his girlfriend. They're great."

Mom nodded and joined me and Alex in the leaf pile. "Who are they?" she asked.

"Renesmee Cullen, Edward Masen, and Bella Dwyer. And I was at Ness's place, and I tripped and knocked myself out – again – and then I woke up and called. I want a purple Beetle."

"Sure you don't want a Silver Beatle?" Alex muttered, and I pushed him off the pile. He laughed, and Mom and I started throwing leaves at him.

_Ah, the good old days,_ I thought, sitting on his legs so he couldn't get up. "So, you never did tell me why you're here."

"Oh, yeah," he said, trying to sit up but failing. "We're moving down here – I was supposed to go to school today, but we only got back like an hour ago."

I leaned against the tree and wondered where they were going to live. Probably in the house down the street. _Great!_ It was nice and quiet for a while, and then I heard a nice honk of a car horn in front of the house.


	9. Chapter 9

_**Renesmee**_

"Will you tell me what's _not good_?" I whispered to Dad. He let me drive his Volvo – for once – and we were sitting outside Jane's house for some odd reason. I was beginning to think no one would come.

"You'll know," Dad said, looking out the window to my right. "You have your own car to drive; I don't see why you need mine."

"You let Mom drive it, and she's got a Ferrari. Besides, it's a _Volvo_. I've driven the Vanquish, but I can't drive _this_? It's cheaper then my Beetle, _sans _paint job."

Dad rolled his eyes. I knew that hit him where it hurt – and I knew that was nearly impossible, mentally and physically. I chuckled and honked again.

"Don't see why I couldn't have just run," I mumbled. "Would've been here and back by then."

Dad looked at me with that strict expression and shook his head. "You'll know _exactly_ why I wouldn't let you run here. Come on." He opened the door and got out. I didn't move, and he looked through the window. "Let's go."

I sighed and undid my seatbelt, grabbing Jane's orange coat from the backseat. Opening my door and getting out, I ran to stand beside Dad, and he led me to the back of the pretty cream-coloured house. I especially liked the blue trim. Dad rolled his eyes again and let me pass him. I stepped carefully around the side of the house, and the first thing I saw was an enormous tree.

"Jane!" I called. She stuck her head out the back door and ran to us. I handed her her coat.

"Thanks," she said, looking at it confusedly. "I guess I left it..."

"You dropped it," Dad said behind me, making Jane jump. "Hello."

Jane waved, a little out of it. She moved out of the way. "You can come visit, if you want."

I turned to Dad, and he nodded. I walked into the nice backyard, and Jane put her coat on, zipping it up all the way, so no one could even see the collar of her shirt. _It's a cool shirt, too,_ I thought, and Dad smiled.

"My people are inside," Jane said, sitting down in an apparently familiar pile of leaves. "Mom and dad and cousin."

"Cousin?" I repeated quickly.

Jane nodded and started playing with a twig from the pile. "Alex is one month older than me. We're tight. On Facebook."

I wondered what the deal was with that website and leaned against the giant tree, crossing my arms lightly. The door slid open behind me, and I peeked around the tree to see a woman who looked almost identical to Jane. She waved, and I assumed she was Jane's mother. She was carrying a big bowl of salad that she placed on a beige picnic table not far away. She went back inside, and Jane snuck off and stole a large piece of lettuce from the bowl. She offered some salad to me and Dad – or my cousin, as he should be known here – and we denied the human food politely.

"Alex is moving down here from Vancouver," Jane said matter-of-factly, returning to the leaf pile.

"I don't want to sound stupid," I said quietly, but I didn't get to finish my sentence.

The door opened again, and Jane's mother came back out, this time carrying a gigantic chicken that looked delicious, even to me – and I preferred a vampire's diet. Dad, who was strangely quiet, looked at me pointedly.

"No," he said simply.

_Please!_ I begged.

He shook his head, and I smirked.

"Ness wants chicken," Jane called to her mother.

She laughed and cut off a piece. "No problem," she said, and I ran and picked up the beautiful piece of chicken.

I stuck my tongue out at Dad. "Sucker," I said, and I ate the piece. "Mmm...."

"Good?" Jane's mom asked. I nodded, comparing my two extremely different diets. _This one isn't that bad, either,_ I thought. _Yum, yum._

Jane looked to the door. "Did he die or something?" she asked.

"He's cleaning up," her mom said. "Ice cream malfunctions."

"And the other one? Is the mess that huge?"

"Yep. It's all over the place."

Jane seemed to think about that for a second. "Works for me," she said with a shrug. "I'll go see if they need help." She looked at me and Dad. "I'll be right back." I nodded, and she ran inside. We waited, and she came back a few minutes later, grinning.

"What's funny?" Dad said, knowing the answer already.

Jane shook her head sadly. "It fell right on the cat."

"Crap," I said, laughing. "It's gonna hate you tomorrow."

"It's the bird who hates baths – the cat loves water. She jumps in the dishwater so she can have a bath. Oh, do you want to meet my bird? He's pretty."

"Sure," I said, following her to the door. "Are you coming, _Ed_?"

Dad scowled at me. "I think I'll stay put, thanks."

I smiled, and Jane led me inside. She opened the door to what appeared to be a reading room, and there was a beautiful bird cage hanging from the ceiling. The door was open, and there was no bird inside.

Jane skilfully held out her hand and called, "_Ici_, Fool!"

There was a small _tweet_ from one book shelf, and the bird flew to Jane's open hand. He hopped there for a second, and the light shone off his feathers. He was an adorable yellow canary, and he was apparently trained.

"Fool?" I asked, holding out my hand. Without hesitating, the bird hopped into my hand, and I pet his head lightly. He cooed happily.

"The Fool on the Hill," Jane said, walking to the birdcage and checking the little water dish. She took it out of the cage. "Be right back," she said, signalling that the dish was empty.

I talked to The Fool on the Hill for a little while, until I heard footsteps behind me. He let me kiss his head, and I set him on my shoulder, confident that he wouldn't poop on me.

"Ness, this is Alex," Jane said, replacing the dish. "He's my cousin, not my brother."

"What?" I said, turning around sharply.


	10. Chapter 10

_**Jane**_

_Are you surprised? _I thought as Renesmee turned around. _Really._

Alex stood just outside the room, looking in. Renesmee looked at him, and I saw a weird look of recognition on her face. She looked around the room and found the clock.

"I have to go," she said. It was so fast, I barely caught it. She ran past Alex, who looked confused. She looked paler than usual, and I wondered whether she was in trouble.

I followed her, and Alex followed me. She went straight out the back door, and Edward seemed less than reluctant to leave. They said goodbye blandly and disappeared quickly.

There was a long, awkward silence as me, Alex, Mom, and Dad looked at each other quizzically. I shrugged.

"Maybe they have to be somewhere?" I offered. The other three accepted the theory, and we went on with life as if nothing had happened. _Canadian outlook, _I thought, remembering how Grandma always said Canadians were friendlier than the others.

We sat down at the picnic table, and Mom happily cut the chicken.

__________

I pulled into the school parking lot the next day, ignoring Alex's taunts about my car. He made a point of touching the front and back windows at the same time, and asked how I could fit anything in here.

"With ease," I said, and I parked in my normal space, having no problem with the two cars on either side pointedly taking some space in the rectangle. I smirked, and Alex rolled his eyes.

"One more professional thing and I'll have to take everything back," he complained, getting out carefully. It looked like he was trying not to hurt the car. He walked to stand beside me, and a few people gaped.

"You've got nothing," I laughed, fiddling with the pad attached to my key. I pressed the button to lock the doors, and the car beeped in a high-pitched but threatening way. It made me think the car was saying _I see you. Glare._

I led Alex to the office, and he got everything he needed for the year. Miss Cope (junior) went on about being at school with your family, and how she had replaced her mother as the secretary. _I know,_ I thought, _I was here two years ago._ It didn't help that she was twenty-five, and that she talked _a lot_ anyway.

"Okay," I said when she finished her most recent sentence. "We, unlike some, have classes to attend in a while. Bye." I grabbed Alex's arm and pulled him out of the building, rolling my eyes.

He let me bring him to the picnic tables. I was a little bit glad that he had no idea why I sat where I did. It was in perfect view of all the parking spaces for the school, and, for some reason, I felt the need to confront Ness on her sudden leaving.

My fingers tapped the mysteriously dry table. For something to do, I looked around at the other tables, wondering why they were wet, while this one wasn't. It was under a tree. It should be just as watery as the others....

"Beat it, shrimp," a familiar voice said dangerously. Keeping calm, I looked up coolly and smiled slightly.

"Hello, David," I said lightly. David grinned and sat down across from me and Alex, to Alex's dislike. I sighed. "Alex Lennon, David North, vice versa."

David waved fractionally, and Alex nodded. They sat there awkwardly for while. Seeming confused, David leaned in and said, "He's not as talkative as John."

That broke the silence easily, and Alex laughed. "That's new," he managed to say. "Usually it's something more annoying."

David shrugged. "Maybe it's only annoying because it's repetitive." He turned to me and kicked the side of the table. "Why are you at my table without permission?"

I snorted. "_Without_ permission? I was under the impression that you specifically said I could sit anywhere. Now, the reason I'm here is very direct, and it may or may not relate to you."

"Does it relate to him?" Alex asked. "What's it about? I thought it was because it was dry."

David pointed to the middle of the tree beside the table, where a medium-sized beige tarp was nestled between the branches. Alex nodded in understanding. David looked back at me. "Does it concern me?"

I thought around for the right answer. "Vaguely," I said, with exaggerated slowness. "But not really. It's more about Renesmee Cullen. If there's one thing I remember from yesterday afternoon, she fled like a guilty dog, and I would like to know what it was about."

He put his hand up, and I let him comment. "Dogs and people both run when they're guilty," he said quickly. "That's all." One thing I really liked about him was that he didn't hover on a subject – he knew when I didn't want to talk. Alex, on the other hand, did not.

"You think she's a dog?" he asked casually. I shrugged, unsure. "Renesmee was the girl who came over yesterday, right?" I nodded. "I don't think she was a dog. She was hot."

"She ran away for no reason."

"That _is_ weird...."

_You're telling me,_ I thought, closing my eyes and shaking my head. I started tapping the table again, to the beat of a song I wanted to listen to. From the corner of my eye, I saw Alex and David roll their eyes.

"The band is not on the run," David muttered. I kept tapping, getting into the second phase of the song. As usual, David flipped my hand over so my fingers were tapping air. His hand held my wrist where it was, and I stopped. He let go. "Thank you." He turned around and examined the lot as cars came piling in, two minutes before the bell. "No Beetle?" he asked suddenly.

"What?" I snapped, looking over his shoulder. There was one empty space near my car that would become occupied in a second by a shiny silver Volvo C30, driven by Renesmee Cullen.


	11. Chapter 11

_**Renesmee**_

"Thanks for letting me drive," I said, flicking Dad's keys in the air beside me. He caught them nimbly and tucked them in his pocket. Mom walked beside him, holding his hand and smiling lightly.

"Thanks for not destroying my car," he said jokingly. Mom elbowed him, and he winced. "Okay. You're welcome."

"Good boy," Mom said happily. She sighed. "To think, I'm back here again. Do I need to go to this school twice?"

Dad laughed and kissed her. "I have attended this hell-hole twice before. The third time will be the last for me."

I tried to smile, but I was engulfed with the idea of having to be here more than once. _Do I have to come back? Or can I go directly to college after?_

"You're going to university," Dad told me, ruffling my hair with his free hand. "You'll be the smartest there. We don't know where _there_ is, at the moment, but it will happen."

I shrugged, dismissing the topic. We were close to the school now, and it was time to pick up our unreal identities. I wanted to apologize to Jane and her cousin for running away last night, and I wasn't sure where I could find her. I looked around and found her sitting at a table under the big tree with Alex and David. I stopped walking, and Mom and Dad did the same.

"I'm going over there," I said, pointing to the group that was pretending not to see us. "See you later." I hugged my parents – or, in this case, my cousin and his girlfriend – and walked towards the table, where Alex and David were suddenly in the middle of a thrilling conversation.

Jane looked up and waved at me. I sat down beside David, who didn't notice my existence. I looked at Jane questioningly, and she shrugged.

"I have _no idea_ what they're talking about," she muttered, looking at them sadly. "Why am I the one who hangs out with the boogers?"

"They're not boogers," I said," they're males." That made Jane laugh, and I smiled. "So, um, yeah. I wanted to apologize for running away."

Jane looked surprised, and the guys stopped talking to stare at me. I felt a little overwhelmed, and a little sick. David was calm – which seemed to be normal – and I couldn't really look at Alex without feeling creeped out.

"Apology accepted?" Jane said. "Could you tell us why you left?"

"I was freaked out," I blurted. I closed my eyes and shook my head, trying to clear it. Feeling stupid, I looked directly at Alex. "You're familiar," I said to him. "But I can't figure out how." He looked confused, and I shook my head again. "Never mind. The bell's going to ring soon."

As soon as I finished my sentence, it rang. I stood up and walked away quickly. I was unsatisfied by my own apology, but there was something about Alex that I couldn't figure out. _Background check,_ I thought to Dad, wherever he was. _What's the deal with Jane's cousin?_

I rushed to my Science class, hoping it would distract me from my thoughts. I was almost in the door when someone grabbed my arm lightly and spun me around.

"Hey," I snapped, pulling my arm away. I looked up. "Oh. Sorry."

"No problem," Dad said quietly. "Now, _the deal_ with Alex Lennon is a lot to understand, and you should _stay away_ from him."

"Why?"

He shook his head. "I'll tell you later." He looked around carefully and disappeared, running down the hall faster than a normal human could see.

With a huff, I stepped into the room just as the second bell rang.

__________

I was ready to smack my face off the desk in front of me, I was so sick of this class. _The second month is definitely worse than the first, _I thought to Dad, who was sitting at the front of the class. I was in the back, in the middle row, sitting beside some annoying girl who seemingly could only talk about some elf from a video game that originated twenty years before me.

With a depressed sigh, I looked up at the clock longingly. _Thirty more seconds,_ I thought, praying that the slowly rotating second hand would not freeze at 11:59:59. _This class will slowly suck the life out of me._

Me and Dad stood up at the exact same time, which was that very 11:59:59 that I dreaded would continue for more than one second. The irritating English teacher didn't notice that we were early, because the bell rang in the middle of her sentence and the class raced to get out of the room.

I heard sighs of relief from my peers as they recognized the freedom known as _a different class_. I said goodbye to Dad and walked slowly to Art.

__________

"You can't eat with us?" Jane asked as we walked out of Art. "Why not?"

I looked up to find an excuse in the sky, but nothing came. I sighed and said, "Because I can't."

She looked at me with an expression of irritation, confusion, and acceptance. "Okay then. That's fine, anyway. I'm left alone today; _David_ is showing Alex the miniscule town, and they'll be at the diner. _So_, I'll be by my lonesome, while they walk around like the sudden best friends they are." She rolled her eyes with a completely different expression, like a mother talking about her two-year-old child. "I have One and Two, anyway."

Mom and Dad came up behind Jane, and I waved to them. Jane turned around and jumped, expecting them to be farther away.

"I'm going out for lunch," I told Mom. _Staying away,_ I added for Dad. "Just me, if that's okay with you."

They shrugged at the same time, and Mom said, "No problem, Ness. See you later." She walked around Jane to hug me, and I smiled. I hugged Dad too, and waved goodbye to Jane.

I felt a little numb as I pulled out of the parking lot and drove away from the school, driving way over the speed limit. _I won't hurt your car,_ I thought, hoping Dad could hear me. _I promise._

I wondered why I had to stay away from Alex. I didn't get any details from Dad, and he said he would tell me later. _When, exactly, _is_ later?_ I thought.

Feeling safely away from people, I closed my eyes to take a deep, calming breath. One didn't help, so I went for another.

The calm feeling around me was broken suddenly, and my eyes snapped open just in time to see two faces indicate that _later_ meant _now_.


	12. Chapter 12

_**Jane**_

The cafeteria was relatively quiet a few minutes into lunch. That, and something else, bothered me. I had the feeling something would happen, but I wasn't sure what it was. I looked around the table for reassurance, but everybody else looked bothered too. Everyone – which consisted of Thing One, Thing Two, Edward, and Bella – all wore the same expression, one that people usually showed during awkward silences. This silence _was_ pretty awkward....

The silence was broken by the loudest scream I had ever heard. When I realized it came from me, I felt a huge pain in my abdomen, like someone had just run me over with a speeding car. I bent over the table, clutching my sides, crying from the pain. I gasped for air, and white sparks were the only thing I could see. I tried to turn in the seat so I could move to the cool floor, but the white sparks disappeared, and there was suddenly nothing but a high-pitch ringing in my ears that quickly disappeared too.

__________

I hurt. It was the only word to describe the pain I was in, before, and now. _I hurt._ One tiny part of me was afraid to open my eyes, and the big part was yelling _OW_ but staying paralyzed. Whether it was my own body that was responsible, or drugs, or some other weird connection, I didn't know. All I did know was that moving would hurt.

_You're breathing, stupid,_ the Voice of Reason told me in its tiny, high voice. _Does _that_ hurt, or does it feel good?_

_It feels nice,_ I replied lightly. _So opening my eyes will feel good too, then?_

_Duh!_

Inner Jane smiled, and I looked for the nerve system so I could open my eyes. I found it quickly, letting them open slowly, in case it did hurt. When I realized it didn't feel bad – it didn't feel good – I let them snap open.

_Umm, _I thought, seeing dark above me and light that seemed far away.

_Lights off in your bedchamber, _Reason told me. _Light-switch be somewhere._

I felt around for the button I had pressed a few times before, but my fingers brushed against cold metal, and a dim light flicked on. I realized it was a touch-lamp, and I carefully tapped it two more times. The light was bright, but it didn't hurt my eyes. I felt almost numb. _I have my own room, _I realized. _Sweet._

I looked around for some way to make my awake-ness known. I found a little switch, and flipped it. The lights in the room went on, and I saw that the switch was connected expertly to the lights. Nobody came for a second, and I almost gave up.

When I thought, _Well, this sucks,_ the door opened. I didn't know who it was, because the hall lights drowned the figure to a shadow with their horribly bright light.

"Hello cello," I said, feeling better suddenly.

"Hi," the person said sadly, closing the door. The hall light disappeared, and I finally saw Renesmee. "I'm sorry."

I stared at her and blinked. I looked around me to see if I was connected to anything of importance, but the only thing was the hospital bracelet. "You already apologized for running away," I mumbled. "Unless you're saying you attacked me with some kind of voodoo doll."

Renesmee shook her head and walked over to my bed. She pulled up a chair beside me, and I sat up carefully. She looked straight at me, and I knew she'd been crying. Her face was red, and her eyes were a little puffed.

"What's wrong?" I asked quickly. "Are you okay?"

She shook her head again, this time in anger. "There is no way either of us will be okay after today. I... don't know." She wiped more tears from her face. "I think I did cause you that pain."

That threw me off the rail. Easily said, I was confused. "I'm confused," I admitted. "How was that possible? _Did_ you use a voodoo doll?"

"No," she whispered. "But... okay, this is way too hard. My dad told me to stay away from your cousin, and I tried to. I thought I _was_ away. But..."

I shrugged. "You weren't. Okay. Did he attack you or something? It's possible, from my family.... Wait, who _is_ your dad?"

Renesmee tried to steady herself with a deep breath. That seemed to make her feel worse. "When you followed me home, you passed out. It wasn't overexertion, though. It was shock. My dad is Edward Cullen, and my mom is Bella Cullen. They are not Masen and Dwyer."

That sunk in, and it seemed familiar. It didn't shock me, though. It reminded me of the conversation. "Right. I remember now. Got it. Tell Alice she's strong for her size."

Renesmee looked happy under the torment. It looked like she was happy to have someone on the inside. "I'll do it. If you don't kill me. This gets me back to the point. No, I was not away from Alex. And I wasn't away from David, either."

"I don't get that. Did you three fight or something? And how does it relate to me?" I was starting to get scared. I knew my mind was doing the normal avoidance of the worst possible answer, which was usually the right one. It made me shake.

Renesmee took two things out of her pocket. One was a hair-tie, and the other was an everyday rubber band. She tied her hair up, and put the rubber band around her wrist. The way she looked at it, I thought she was going to punish herself with a little snap of the rubber against her arm. Like it would hurt at all. She opened her mouth to speak, but she quickly closed it and snapped the band.

"Don't do that," I scolded her, pulling it off her wrist and pulling it until it broke. She still watched the place where it used to be. "Why can't you tell me what happened?" I asked quietly.

She started sobbing, and I didn't know what to do. I sat back, scared of her reaction. I was really lost when she put her hand out and touched my forehead, like she was going to put a picture there.

A picture _did_ show up there, and I let out a small gasp. I knew it was too important, so I didn't pull away, even though I was terrified. The image in my mind was the road, and familiar surroundings, seen from the inside of a car. It went dark for a second, and then it came back. There was a spiked feeling that made me want to be sick, and I saw Alex and David crossing the road. They turned to look straight at me – or maybe it was Renesmee – and the image went white.

She pulled her hand away, and I gaped at nothing. She touched my stomach, right where the huge pain was earlier. She couldn't say anything, and I was afraid she would crack and explode. I doubted that I could get a sound out myself.

"Ohmygod." My mouth barely moved as I mouthed the word.


	13. Chapter 13

_**Renesmee**_

I broke down again, seeing the scene over and over again. I closed my eyes and focused on mentally hurting myself and trying to spare my friend of that hurt. _I don't care if it's impossible,_ I screamed to my own thoughts. _I have to try! Someone call the doctor..._

Jane stared at me, not like I expected at all. I expected terror or hate or sadness, but the only thing I saw was shock. I wasn't even sure if she was shocked from seeing _the_ image, or seeing _an_ image, or just the idea of me feeling horrible.

The door opened behind me, and Jacob came to me. He tried to make me calm down, but I ignored it.

"Go away," I snapped, making myself feel worse. "Go get Carlisle."

He didn't seem overly happy about me still feeling horrible, but he left without a word. Carlisle came in a few seconds after Jacob left, and he pulled up a chair beside me. I wasn't sure what to do, so I thought, _Help me_.

"I shouldn't have let you out," he said, making me stand up. "Go back to your room and calm down."

I shook my head, but I went anyway. That was the one thing I needed – calm. _It's pretty damn hard to calm down when everybody around me is freaking out!_ I screamed internally. I burst into the hall, and Dad caught me before I could punch a dynamic hole in the wall.

"Calm down, _now_," he ordered, grabbing both my shoulders and stopping me in my tracks. "Hurting yourself will not help anybody. Trust me, I know."

I glared up at him. He looked unhappy, but I was sure he had no idea how _I_ felt. _I repeat my thought from before! Leave me alone._ He didn't let go, so I decided to play hard. _Do you _want_ to know how Mom felt when you left?!_

My glare and my thought hit him hard, and he let go immediately. "I'm sorry," he mumbled. "Go ahead."

"Thank you," I hissed, walking to some unknown destination. I looked around crazily, and settled on hiding in the bathroom. I swung through the door easily, and decided to stare into one of the three sinks.

_What to do?_ I thought as I took a calming breath. _God, where is Jasper when I need him? Not here._ I turned the hot water tap on and let it run down the drain. After a few painful seconds, I turned the taps on the other two sinks and let the air around me warm.

"So, this is what panic feels like," I said to myself. "How am I supposed to calm down when I don't know what would make me calm? Usually everything around me is calm. Calm Forks. Calm Renesmee. Why doesn't anybody say good ways to calm down?" Maybe chewing gum would work. It would definitely help, since biting the inside of my cheek was helping nothing.

I pulled a new pack of gum out of my pocket and ripped the plastic off, tossing it in the garbage under the sinks. It was the best kind, a light, tropical flavour, and I hoped it would help me level off. At an inhuman speed, I flipped the package open and started with a random piece.

A few minutes later, I walked out of the bathroom, feeling way more composed than I did before. I felt better, so I decided to go back to Jane's room.

__________

Carlisle was already gone, and Jane was reading a big book in her bed. I took a few steps before she noticed I was there, and then she waved to me. I waved back guiltily, and sat down in my unmoved chair.

"You hit them both," Jane said matter-of-factly, putting down her book. "But, apparently, they're fine. For now, at least."

I sighed. "What happened to them?"

"Um, a lot. You ran right into Alex – thanks, by the way – but David only hit the side of the bumper, so he's going to have a scar from the metal."

"I'm sorry," I repeated. "I stopped as fast as I could, you know."

"Yeah," she said lightly, "but he's not great. I think he tried to jump so he wouldn't get run over. He's got a couple big cuts and a beautifully broken leg. Right near the foot, so he's not allowed to stand until it gets better." She looked at me carefully. "Carlisle told me. I haven't seen them yet. Do you want to come with me?" I shook my head, and then nodded. "I'm taking that as a yes."

She flipped the blanket off her legs and stood up. I was surprised by how fast she was, considering that she was just sitting in a hospital bed. I knew it was just in case, but still. I stood up too, and Jane walked halfway to the door.

"Are you coming?" she said. "I think you should apologize to them, more than me."

I sighed again and walked past her, opening the heavy door. I looked down the hall and nodded to the last door. We walked quietly to the room, and I saw that the door wasn't closed all the way. Jane and I exchanged a look, and she knocked.

"Just go in," I whispered. "The worst they can do is kick us out."

Jane snorted. "The worst _we_ can do is see them when they don't want to be seen."

I knew what that meant – I didn't try to fight the laugh that came. It made me feel so much better. My guilt was gone for one second, and then it came back, not as heavy as before, but still strong. With a light shake of my head, I nudged Jane out of the way and opened the door, closing my eyes.

"Aloha," Jane said as I let the door close behind me. I walked forward carefully, blinded by my eyelids. I knew it was because I didn't want to see the damage I had done. _Gramps is going to arrest me,_ I realized.

"Good morning," two voices said, making me think about opening my eyes. I felt around and sat in a chair close to the door.

"What's with you?" David asked me. I shook my head. "You have issues."

"She really does," Jane agreed. "Ness, open your eyes. They're fine."

Almost unwillingly, I opened my eyes. When I saw them, I was glad I came in.

David was sitting in front of one of the big chairs on the other side of the room, playing Solitaire on the floor. The only thing that wasn't normal about him was a bruise on his forearm that I assumed was from the car. He was smiling as if nothing had happened.

I looked to the bed a few feet away, expecting a horrible scene. But Alex looked fine. He was reading one of the biggest books I'd ever seen. There were scrapes on his hands, and his left cheek. He was sitting on a row of pillows, and it looked like he was wearing a brace over his left knee. He looked up at me and waved.

"I think you're forgiven," Jane said. She sat on the ground beside David and observed his game of Solitaire.

"Maybe," I muttered. I heard footsteps coming down the hall, and I knew who was coming. That put one thought in my head, and my fast-beating heart went a little faster.

_No. _


	14. Chapter 14

_**Jane**_

I pretended not to hear Renesmee's _maybe_. I knew these two enough: if you hurt them and they could talk after, they forgave you. But Ness seemed really negative about something, and I realized what it was when I heard big boots outside the door. We all looked up as Chief Swan stuck his head in the room.

Renesmee was standing behind the door, her guilty expression right back where it was. She still looked ridiculously pale, compared to the slightly flushed look she usually had.

"Hey kids," Charlie said. "Anyone see Renesmee?"

I stared at Ness, and she stepped out from her hiding place. "Hi, Charlie," she whispered.

He waved a hand at her and she followed him into the hall with her head hanging. I wanted to do something to make her look less self-imploding, but all I could do was sit and wait.

"You'd think she was a cherub or something," David said loudly. "She doesn't seem accustomed to getting in trouble."

I shrugged, not knowing what to do at the moment. "She feels horrible. Let it be. And don't be loud, I'm right here."

Alex laughed, and cut himself off quickly. "That really hurts," he complained, putting his book down. "It's like being winded, except it won't go away."

"What's that about?" David laughed. "You fell on your face trying to reach that book."

"Do you have an accent?" I asked quickly and stupidly. "I never noticed an accent before." David scowled, and Alex grinned, making sure he didn't laugh. I had to smile a little. "It's like a dead English accent!"

"Yeah," he mumbled. "It really comes when I yell."

I was about to scream, _I love you and your accent, _when Renesmee came back in. I couldn't read her expression – it was a big mixture of everything. I suddenly wondered what the definition of "trepidation" was.

"Anxiety or nervousness," David whispered. I looked at him sharply and he said, "I was thinking it. Don't pretend you weren't."

I nodded, turning back to Renesmee. "What's up?" I asked.

She looked up and smiled uneasily. "I'm getting off with speeding, because closing your eyes isn't illegal, but jay-walking is." She looked at David and Alex with raised eyebrows. "Why were you so far out of town, anyway?"

The guys looked at each other and shrugged. They turned to Ness and shrugged again.

"Just 'cause, I'd say," Alex said. "This place isn't very big. Everywhere is _down the street_. It's so... tiny. Like a town in southern Ontario."

I had to agree there. David moved over so I could pick up the Solitaire game he had abandoned. Moving like a Canadian-born master, I piled up the four suits and shuffled the cards in the silence. I looked up, disappointed.

"Say something," I snapped.

"Something," the other three said. David grinned beside me, and I lightly threw the cards at him. They flew all over the place, and he had trouble picking them up.

"Well," Renesmee said. "That's all I can say in that sentence. I'm sorry I ran you over. But I'm not sorry I'm here."

Alex smiled at her, still the friendly, forgiving Canadian I haven't been in ten years. "Thanks," he said. "You can come over here, you know. Visit."

Renesmee nodded with an unwilling smile, and she walked over to sit on one of the chairs near Alex's bed. Now she looked relatively happy, but a little nervous. _A mixture of happiness and trepidation,_ I thought, remembering a show I used to watch that was cancelled, which I still love, and whose main character is next to Paul McCartney on my list of people I want to marry but can't.

"Long thought," David commented, waving the deck of cards in front of my face. I took it and set up another game of Solitaire.

"Yeah," I muttered. "I love your accent."

"Thanks?" he said, confused.

"Oh my Beatle," I sighed. "Too long has passed, and it sits in my throat every day waiting for me to screw up somehow and speak my thoughts." I looked at everyone, who stared back with expressions that told me they were absolutely lost. I could practically see the question mark over each of their heads. Only Alex looked like he was trying to understand what I had said.

"Could you say that in American?" David asked.

I dropped the cards I was holding and stood up. "I will translate it for you, then," I announced. "For years I've had this thought in my head. I've always been – I don't know – afraid to tell what that thought was. There were also these factors that screwed me over. Those factors were always the same." I took a deep breath and walked backwards to the door.

"Are you leaving?" Renesmee asked me. "I'm just getting comfortable."

I tried to find an excuse, but I came up with nothing. So I did what I always did when I could come up with nothing. I looked at David and said, "Help."

He immediately got up and came to me. I opened the door, and he followed me out. There was nobody there, and the light above us flickered.

"Nice," I muttered. I looked up at David, and he looked down helpfully. "So, do you know what those factors are?" I asked him.

He looked to the end of the hall – one door away – and out the window. There was nothing to see out there though – the sky was black with a close-coming storm. "I think I should know," he said. "Should I know?"

I rolled me eyes. "Well, yeah! Would you like me to name them off for you?"

"Yes please," he said.

There was an immense rumble of thunder outside, and I looked out the window to see a bright purple flash of lightning before the lights went out above us. From my frequent visits here, I learned that the generators only backed up the power in the rooms, and the "safety lights" in the hall didn't turn on until a few minutes after.

"Great," I mumbled into the dark. I found the wall and leaned against it carefully. "So, naming off the factors. Cassandra, Kelsey, Mackenzie, Jaime, Jordin... to name a few."

There was a light tapping on the wall, and I recognized it as David's tapping – something he did whenever he was making a decision. I waited for a response from him, but there was no sound other than the tapping and the thunder outside.

I tried to find a pattern in the random tapping, but I ended up finding a pattern in the names of David's past girlfriends: in the past couple years, all their names started with the same letter.

There was another bright flash of lightning. In the fraction of a second that the hall was illuminated, I saw that David was looking directly at me. Then it was black again.

I felt warm and fuzzy inside when I put the last piece in. The warmth and fuzziness got warmer and fuzzier when I felt David kiss me.

"J is for Jane," I said against his lips.


	15. Chapter 15

_**Renesmee**_

I was in the middle of my sentence when I laughed out loud. Alex rolled his eyes, but didn't bother to ask what was funny. It took me a second to make myself stable enough to finish what I was saying, but I started a whole new sentence.

"You know what's _great_ about your cousin?" I said. Alex shrugged, which meant to say, _A lot?_ "It's really easy to make her smile and-or laugh."

Alex took a water bottle from the case beside my chair. "Would you care to explain?" he said.

I stood up and bowed. "Of course. Watch and learn, Canuck."

He didn't look bothered by the title, so I walked to the door. With an evil snicker, I yanked it open and jumped out into the hall with a sharp left turn into the bright darkness.

"Jane Asher's finally got her Paul McCartney!" I exclaimed. "For the love of Beatles, keep it to a PG rating!" I retreated into the room, laughing so hard, a normal human would've thrown up.

Jane came in after me with tears in her eyes, and David stumbled in behind her. Jane let herself fall to the floor and laughed between horizontal coughs. David caught the end rail of Alex's bed and held himself up while he choked on air. Alex sat there, laughing either at them or at me. I slid down the wall behind the door and laughed at everything.

Somewhere around then, Carlisle came in and told us to quiet down. When Jane repeated my quote, he chuckled and left the room. We erupted in louder laughs until none of us could breathe anymore.

__________

It was almost half an hour later when we could get a full sentence out without cracking up again. We were all situated in random parts of the room: Alex on his bed, which had slid a foot to the left when David slipped, me in front of the door, and Jane and David sitting together playing Snap with the single deck of cards.

"So," I attempted, "there was truth in my statement, no?" There was a light knock at the door, and I knocked back. Carlisle laughed on the other side and walked away.

"Don't sound so French, you shower-bag," Jane said. "But, _oui_, there is truth in that statement." She caught her card before David, and slapped his hand.

"I feel very English," David agreed, not bothering to muffle his accent. "I thank my aunt and uncle for teaching me to talk."

"You're so practical," Alex said, looking at his cousin and her now-boyfriend in confusion. "Just sitting there playing cards instead of being like some other people."

_I agree wholeheartedly,_ I thought. _Maybe they could teach some people I know..._

__________

We were advised to stay at the hospital overnight, because Alice pointed out that the storm outside was – quote – _horrific_. Since everyone listened to Alice always, I gave in.

One thing came with sleeping somewhere that wasn't home. His name was Jacob Black. I wasn't annoyed at all when he showed up and terrified my friends. In fact, when that thought crossed my mind, I was stunned into silence for a full minute before I could recover from the fact that those two people I had recently run over were now my friends. Maybe near-death created bonds, maybe not.

There was only _one_ option. We would fight to the death – figuratively – to all stay in the same room. When I showed Dad that I was absolutely serious, he went out and bought four double air mattresses, which I situated skilfully in different places in our refuge, AKA the hospital room that we refused to leave.

So, there we were, lying on each of our beds with big, poofy comforters and pillows that Dad had also bought, letting our conversation branch off from the topic of _where did he get all this stuff in half an hour_ to _I wonder where we'll be next year_.

"I think we'll still be here," Jane said from my left. "This place is like a supermassive black hole. It keeps you where you're supposed to be."

"Supermassive doesn't quite cut it," David put in from beside Jane. "Maybe it cuts it too much. Why isn't it just a vacuum? And, speaking of vacuums, why is it spelled with two U's?"

"Because, an American created the word," Alex said from the farthest left. "What kind of Canadian would spell a word so horribly wrong?"

"You," I said, and four people laughed. "Where's Jacob...?"

Jane sat up and looked around without saying anything.

"He left ten minutes ago," David said, looking at me around Jane. I pushed her back onto the mattress, and he nodded. "He said something about _the pack_ and went _poof_."

I wasn't surprised. I nodded, and continued with the new branch in the conversation. "It's a long story – none of you would begin to imagine it. Well, Jane would, but she can't tell. _Right, Jane_?" I looked at her firmly.

She blinked, and then remembered what I meant. Her expression changed from _meh_ to _right_ quickly, and she shook her head. "No telling," she mumbled, and she closed her eyes.

"Hmm," Alex said, looking ready to crash too. "I agree." He turned to the wall, and I knew he was asleep after less than a minute.

David and I exchanged a shrug, and I got up to flip the lights off. I didn't need any light to see where I was going.

I lay down on my mattress and closed my eyes, searching for a topic to help me fall asleep. But the only thing I could think wasn't even my own voice. It sounded like someone was trying to put a thought in my head, and it was engulfing everything else, including the big piece of guilt that still hung in front of me.

_Don't trust him,_ the voice whispered to me. _Don't trust him, don't trust him, don't trust him..._

_Why? _I wanted to ask. _Why shouldn't I trust him? And who is he?_

_Don't trust him._


	16. Chapter 16

_**Jane**_

Since I had no real injuries, and David only had little ones, we were allowed to leave as soon as the storm ended the next day. Alex wasn't as lucky, and he had to stay two weeks to finish healing. I brought him work everyday, and he unhappily accepted it.

When he got out, though, he was right into everything. He flew through assignments and finished his homework at school. He adjusted to Forks – and the States in general – fast. He made friends like any normal person.

I had one big problem now, at the end of October: Renesmee was avoiding us.

Every day since the accident, she would only eat with Edward and Bella. She would talk to me as usual, but she never said a word around Alex or David, which was strange, because I was usually with one or both of them.

I ate a carrot and glared at the table where R, E, and B sat, wondering what was wrong. How much convincing did she need, anyway? You can't be anyone's friend if you run away from them.

Thing One and Thing Two looked at me worriedly, and Alex and David looked at the table too. David looked as annoyed as I felt, and Alex looked like he was plotting an attack.

"Just drop it," Ashlyn advised.

"No kidding," Kiera agreed.

David just nodded.

Alex stared at Renesmee.

I sighed and tried to find something to take my attention off being confused. When I found nothing, I said, "The bird needs help."

David looked at me and grinned. "The bird needs to get out of the sixties, girl." He had kept his accent, and it made me smile every time I heard him talk. _That's not overdramatic,_ I thought to no one, _it's true._

"The sexy accent is right," Kiera said. "Start talking like you're from over here. This time and place."

"It's like the difference between 'don't sweat it' and 'no problem'," Ashlyn said. "'Girl' and 'bird' are the same. At least... they were, when The Beatles were around."

I smiled and threw a carrot at Alex. He turned around and seemed to snap back to normal. I nodded, and he went back to evil-looking Alex.

_Whatever,_ I thought.

__________

It felt weird to spy. Sure, I'd spied before, but that caused me enough stress that I passed out. I had promised myself not to spy anymore, but this was just creepy.

I crouched high up in my tree, looking over the house next door, to Alex's house. It was a nice vantage point – I could see Alex clearly in the backyard, sitting against his own tree on a thick blanket, paying very close attention to his laptop.

"Binoculars," I whispered unnecessarily to David, who was sitting on the branch below mine. He held up the binoculars, and I took them. Focusing them carefully, I looked at the screen of Alex's laptop.

"What's with that stick?" David asked, looking at the sharp-looking thing sitting a couple feet away from Alex. "Is it supposed to be a stake or something? There are no vampires here."

_That's where you're wrong,_ I thought, shuddering at the thought of my cousin hunting my almost-ex-friend. "Oh crap," I mumbled. I squinted into the lenses and almost dropped the binoculars. I gripped them tighter. "I really hope I'm not seeing this: _Vampires A to Z_. I think there's something about _not hunting humans_."

David laughed. "That's weird," he said. "Do you want to tell me something I don't know?"

I lowered the binoculars. "There are vampires in Forks," I blurted. I let out a bunch of swears at my stupidity and willingness to answer questions. "YOU CAN'T SAY ANYTHING!!!!!"

"There are _apparently_ vampires in Forks?" David said. He forced back a laugh and looked up at me. "How come nobody's died here lately then?"

I pressed my lips into a tight line and shook my head. He shrugged and almost fell out of the tree. I smiled slightly as he gripped the branch tightly.

"Idea," I gasped. I jumped out of the tree and grabbed my little laptop. "Hmm..." A few minutes of fiddling with the keys later, I was online, and on the same website as Alex. I looked through everything, and then I went to another website that was in my history – how I loved hacking – and saw something not-so-pleasant. I felt myself pale.

"What's wrong?" David asked. He climbed to my branch and looked at the computer. "Why do you want to find ways to kill a vampire?"

I shook my head and looked at Alex, two doors down. "I don't want to find ways to kill a vampire. Alex does."

David rolled his eyes and kissed the top of my head. "You're crazy. Come on; let's do something productive."

I gave him an evil look. "Can you rephrase that sentence please?"

He smiled. "Get me out of this tree."

__________

_We are so cool,_ I thought as I dragged the box of old movies to the TV. I dug through the box – which was bigger than me – and found the one I wanted to watch.

"Are you joking? David laughed. "You're seventeen, and you still watch _Peter Pan_?"

"Hells yes," I said, yanking the VCR out of the box and plugging it into the TV. The doorbell rang, and I dropped everything in. "Channel four," I told David, and I ran to the entry to get the door. They rang the bell again, and I opened the door.

I looked at them confusedly – all nine of them. Renesmee was in front, and she looked terrified and angry.

There was an indescribable silence as David came to stand behind me. For the first time in two weeks, Renesmee actually looked at him. There was a spark of sadness behind her eyes, as she turned back to me. Her family stood behind her, looking more human than even I expected. There was an attempt at calmness, which was quickly shot down by the tense fear. I moved to let the vampires into my house, realizing that David didn't actually _know_ they were vampires.

I locked the door behind them – and the bolt, and the chain – and turned to Renesmee, pushing the door even more closed.

"I think I know," I whispered.

David looked from me, to them, and back again. "Oh," was all he said.

"Your cousin is hunting us," Renesmee breathed.


	17. Chapter 17

_**Renesmee**_

I managed to choke the words out before I passed out cold. I felt myself waking up a while later – even though "a while" could've meant any amount of time. There weren't two people around me when I came to – only David, who was sitting beside me calmly.

"I didn't think she was serious," he said, as soon as I opened my eyes. "We were spying, and she hacked into Alex's connection, and there were websites about vampires: different kinds of vampires, different ways to kill them...." He wasn't looking directly at me, but a little to the right, and that made me feel horrible. Like knowing you were lied to because you weren't worth the truth.

Being very careful not to move too fast – for David's sake and for mine – I sat up. There was a light but painful throbbing in the back of my head that refused to go away. I ignored it and looked at David meekly.

"You're not supposed to force an unconscious person awake," he said matter-of-factly, in a nice English accent, still not looking at me. I felt tears in my eyes, knowing that I felt guilty for ignoring the wrong person, and for making _him_ ignore _me_. It wasn't even in a deep way, either – I had just never felt rejection, and even though I had probably hurt him, he _was_ my friend.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled. I let my head fall on my knees, and I wrapped my arms around my legs to cry. I felt a hand on my back, and I knew David was trying to reassure me it was okay.

"Don't be sorry for _anything_," he told me. I looked at him around my arm, and he still looked calm.

"I have to be sorry," I whispered. "I ran you over –"

"You didn't touch me."

"– and I ignored you –"

"You're not the first."

I tried to think of something else, but came up with nothing. With a groan of defeat, I let myself fall back so I was sprawled on the carpet with my eyes closed. The quiet was nice for a while.

David took a deep breath and said, "I thought vampires were supposed to have fangs."

My eyes snapped open and I glared up at him. When I saw his smile, though, I felt myself loosen, as if a light weight had been taken off me. _What acceptance can do to people,_ I thought. _Or maybe it's Jasper._

"That's a common myth," I explained. "They don't _need_ fangs if they're intensely strong. And what should be blood and saliva is actually venom. I refuse to say anything more, because we are being watched."

David nodded, and his smile got wider. He looked straight at me, and from this angle, he _really_ looked like Paul McCartney. His accent wasn't exactly the same, but I would've bet anything that someone somewhere thought he was a perfect reincarnation. _Jane,_ I realized, letting out a half-laugh.

"I understand," David said. He looked around, and I did the same. "They're locking _everything_."

He frowned, and it looked so unnatural, I said, "Don't do that." It wiped the frown away, leaving a relatively blank look. "Okay, I have a really horrible question for you." He nodded, allowing me to ask. "What's your grandfather's name?"

He looked at me sideways, probably trying to figure out where that came from. "John," he said slowly.

I felt a tiny smile on my face. "The wolves are patrolling around the house," I told David quietly. I sat up and said, even quieter, "If there's one thing Alex doesn't know about us, it's our friends."

David grinned and winked, putting a finger to his lips. "I knew there was something about Jacob," he said slyly. "They're not werewolves, of course." I shook my head.

I showed him the promise bracelet Jacob gave me for my first Christmas. It fit me nicely now. David took my wrist and looked at it closely. I shifted closer so he could see it better, because I refused to take it off for anything and anyone.

I was pointing out the little but important pieces on it when Jane came in from the miniature library, followed by her bird.

"Have you _seen_ this?" David asked without looking up. He was practically hugging my arm so he could examine the bracelet, but I barely noticed.

Jane did, and she looked amused. She sat down across from David and looked at the bracelet. "Maybe I should get one," she said.

I shrugged, and David gripped my arm tighter. I rolled my eyes. "You're so weird," I muttered. "It's a promise bracelet. _He_ would have to get it."

"Like he'd give it to me," Jane said, now looking at David. "You're obsessed," she said loudly.

David shook his head and finally let go of my arm. I wasn't expecting it, and it hit the floor with a _thud_. It felt colder after he let go – only because he was holding it for so long. It was a little bit like hugging Dad after hugging Jacob.

"I'd never be able to make one," David said. "That thing's how old? And there isn't a flaw in it at all. It's not even dirty."

I shrugged. "I'm possessive. And, no, you wouldn't be able to make one. Only the Quileutes know how." I smiled and nodded firmly. Then I frowned. "Why are we hiding from one human? That's just stupid."

"You're not hiding," Jane said. "_We_ are. Alice said he might use bait. Or he'd get me to lead him to your house." She looked at David sternly and said, "You don't know _anything_, got it?"

David shook his head. "I don't know anything – about these people I've never met, and about the wolves that are non-existent and definitely not patrolling the house."

Jane's eyes rolled from David to me, and she pursed her lips. I shrugged with wide eyes, trying to say, _It's not _my_ fault!_

Her face went blank. "What's the date today?"

I checked my mental calendar and rolled my own eyes. "December twenty-first."

"Of course," Jane whispered, heaving a long sigh.

There was a loud knock at the front door, and my family flashed into the room. Dad and Alice both looked irritated, and I guessed there was more confusion on the other side of the door. The knock came again, and Jane shakily got up and walked slowly to the door.

It was absolutely silent in the room, and everyone was tense. David and I stood up at the same time, and he was directly between me and the door. A tiny part of me was glad that he was there, because I didn't feel as exposed as I would have.

Jane looked through the peep-hole and quickly turned around. Her arms were stretched out, figuratively holding the door in place. Her face was white, and her eyes were wide.

"He's here," she squeaked. She looked to my family for advice.

I turned to see everyone looking at Dad and Alice. They were both frowning, and neither of them said a word. I stepped around David.

"Open it," I said boldly.


	18. Chapter 18

_**Jane**_

It was a strange thought, but I knew I had to trust Renesmee's judgement. She nodded, and I unfroze. I turned back to the door slowly and looked through the hole again. There were five people there, all people I thought I could trust.

In front was Holly Holland. I always liked her name, and she was always interested in vampires. Apparently it was a very real interest. Her bright blond hair was tied up in a high and tight ponytail, and her green eyes burned.

Behind her, to my left and her right, was her second, Galen Westlake. He was relatively new, having moved here two years ago. He had light brown hair and dark brown eyes.

Behind him was Jessie Coven, whose last name was ironic right now. She was petite – everybody helped her with anything athletic, but I knew she was fast and strategic. Her dark red hair fell in waves around her freckled face.

On Holly's other side was Eric Wilson, who sort of reminded me of an anime character, because of his overly big blue eyes and perfectly messy black hair.

Behind him was Alex, who looked a little bit lost, and was the bottom of the group, and apparently just the rat.

They all looked pleasant, but protective.

"So I'm letting _them_ in?" I whispered. "They have backpacks. I think there might be stakes in them."

I heard a cracked laugh behind me, and I assumed the stakes would crumble as soon as they hit the vampires.

"You assume correctly," Edward said calmly. "Open the door."

They circled around me, and Holly rang the doorbell. I nodded, and pulled the chain and the bolt, turning the door's lock with ease. I flicked the handle down fast, so they wouldn't see it turn. I looked to Edward, and he nodded.

I yanked the door open, and the five people who were outside came in quickly. They didn't _seem_ to be doing anything, and now that they were inside, they looked a little doubtful.

Edward and Alice flitted by them and took all their bags. Alice suddenly held them all with a cute smirk. "Stakes?" she said. "Really?"

"Hello," I said smoothly. I looked at Alex and said, "Yeah, you're beat."

He glared at me, and at the people around me. "You know, Canada's the same as America," he said. "Same vampires, at least." He looked around the circle and turned back to me. His group circled around itself defensively. They seemed pretty pro for a bunch of seventeen-year-olds. "Last year, twenty-seven people in my Science class were killed, including the teacher. I, meanwhile, was in the office, picking up forms from my teacher's mailbox. Do you know how nice it is to come back and see _twenty-seven_ people lying on the floor without blood?"

Everyone was looking at him now, including his group.

"The two people left were me, and someone who was mysteriously not there." Alex looked more vulnerable than I had ever seen him, even when he was seven years old. "I knew right away what it was. And I knew how it happened. I ran back to the office, and I saw someone out the window, who just happened to be one of my good friends. Her eyes were bright red, and there was blood on her sleeves. She looked at me and ran, and I told them what happened. The school went on lockdown. I never went back."

Holly gaped at Alex, more than everyone else. Alex stood there, in the back, eyes wide. He was really pale, and he looked like he was about to be sick. In fact, I knew he was about to be sick.

"Can we put this on hold for _two seconds_?" I said as everyone still looked at Alex. I turned and ran to the storage cupboard, pushing the mop bucket on him and forcing him out the door before he threw up.

I walked back in, and everyone looked at me. I looked from the vampires to the humans, to Renesmee, who was stuck in between.

"Why do you think you can hurt them?" I asked. Everybody was pale – the vampires in their normal way, the humans in some kind of fear. Renesmee looked ready to be sick, and I felt the same way.

"Caius said it was easy," Holly said fiercely.

The vampires hissed, and I wondered if they knew that Caius person.

"_Caius is a vampire_," Bella exclaimed.

Alice and Edward both closed their eyes, and I knew that, whoever Caius was, he was _not_ good.


	19. Chapter 19

_**Renesmee**_

"We can't pretend it didn't happen," the one named Holly whispered. She looked horrible, as if she was reliving a horrible memory over and over again. She probably was. "There's no way to reverse any of this. I'm sorry."

"That's okay," Jasper said, sending out another light wave of calm, just in case. It was especially centered on Alex, who was sitting a little out of the circle, clutching the red bucket like a terrified child would hold their teddy bear.

"So, we're not safe at all," Jessie clarified. "We can't just walk around like we never met him."

I frowned. "What was he _doing_ here at all?" I whispered, looking to Dad and Alice.

"He came with Jane, to exterminate someone who was 'causing trouble'," Dad muttered. "Alex's friend."

Alex squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. Holly put her hand on his arm, and he seemed to calm a little.

"I guess she deserved it," Alex said quietly. "She killed half my school."

"Where did you see him again?" David asked.

Eric shook his head. "There was this _smoke_, and we followed it and Caius and – what's her name? Jane? – well, they were there. They just looked at us and told us, and they said it was their job to destroy vampires – his exact words – and that there were never enough hunters. I have no idea. He just convinced us."

_There's no way to get out of it now,_ I realized.

__________

"Well, that was a really weird success," David said, lounging across the couch with his head on Jane's lap. "Not a very pleasant outcome, but at least nothing happened."

It seemed like they were reluctant to leave. My family left first, for good reasons. Jessie wanted to watch another movie, but she forced herself to leave, because she had to work. Eric followed her quickly, remembering that they both worked at the same place, and to ask her out after their shift was over. After a short silence, Alex shrugged and left with the bucket. Holly went after him and brought it back, only to follow him to his house.

_So, here we are,_ I thought. I lay on the floor, quite comfortable, thanks very much, and Galen asked me questions about humans, vampires, half-vampires, and me. Most of them were about me, and I had to explain my ability at least twice. It was probably that he just wanted to hear about it, because I knew it wasn't something one could easily forget.

"Here's an idea," David said, jumping into the conversation. "How about you stop hogging the 'ability' and let us see?"

I rolled my eyes and scooted over to the couch. "Jane's already seen it," I told him. Jane frowned, and I remembered what I had showed her. _Yuck_, I thought. I blinked to put the image away, and I found the one I was just thinking of. It was from years ago – when Zafrina showed me the jungle. I touched David's forehead – and, to be nice, Jane's hand – and showed them the picture.

David grinned, too calm to jump, which was what people usually did. Jane smiled at the fresh forest. I pulled away, and they both looked a little disappointed.

"It's not always fun," I told them.

"Hey," Galen said, thinking of yet another question. "If humans are normal, and vampires are cold, shouldn't you be in between?"

I moved back to him and met his dark eyes. "No, I'm really warm."

"What about the slow-aging and the not-aging? Do you age fast?"

I nodded. "I'm pretty much done growing now. I'm six years old biologically, but physically, I'm... nineteen-ish."

Galen smiled brightly, and I had to smile too. "I'm seventeen years old biologically and physically. My birthday's March tenth."

_Wicked._ "Mine's September tenth. Your birthday is my half-birthday. And vice versa. It's awesome!"

"Epic," Galen agreed.

__________

Our lunch table expanded ridiculously. I wasn't so sure the word _expanded_ was as correct as _exploded_. We even had to pull another table in so that everyone could sit. We were a gigantic lunch group: me, Jane, David, Alex, Ashlyn (Thing One), Kiera (Thing Two), Jessie, Holly, Eric, and Galen, in that order around the two tables. We sat in the back corner, where we could take up as much space we wanted without bothering with anybody else's.

There was never an awkward or tense moment, nobody bickered, and everybody got along really well. I was told that the five sort-of-vampire-hunters were getting along better than they had before.

Mom and Dad, AKA Bella Dwyer and Edward Masen, both strangely "moved out of town" after the first semester's exams. The other ten of us knew that they were still in town, and that they felt no need to come back to school, because the reason they came in the first place was to see me off. Now that I had a big group of friends, they said their work was done, and that I would see them when I got home.

__________

The topic of the Volturi was strictly forbidden. We didn't mention Caius or Jane, and, not-so-secretly, we all hoped nothing more would happen with them, and they would never be the topic of a conversation at our tables.

That was where we were at the moment I thought about that. We were at our tables, they were eating lunch, and I was thinking too deeply.

"Will they burn us too?" Galen suddenly asked.

All talking stopped, and I felt a light ringing inside my head.

I gave him a look that reminded him it was _off-limits­_, and he looked back sadly. I felt my expression wash off my face, and I moved my chair to sit closer to him.

"I couldn't tell you," I said quietly. "They _are_ vampires, after all."

He nodded, and I wondered what would happen when – not if – they came back for me.

I stood up and practically ran from the table, bursting through the doors and only stopping when I was hidden in the trees. I leaned against a tree and cried for almost no reason. I knew not to be afraid of them – Aro was their leader, and he was remotely sensible. But still, I was scared.

The snow started falling, wet and sticky outside my shelter. I stared at the ground for what seemed like hours, but it was really only a few seconds. A bunch of people came outside, surprised to see the white stuff falling.

"Sorry," I heard beside me.

"It's okay," I whispered back. "I'm just digesting."

Galen came and stood in front of me, trying to make eye contact. I sighed and looked up. He looked like he had just lost his best friend, and almost as pale as a vampire.

"Life sucks," Galen muttered.

"It really does," I agreed, and I hugged him, needing assurance that I wasn't the only one who was scared.


	20. Chapter 20

_**Jane**_

I shuddered as I closed the door, remembering my oath to a book I read when I was eleven. That book was life-changing – it made me realize why I got sick every February.

_Valentine's Day_. I gagged just thinking the word. A day for _hearts_ and _love_ and _pink_ and _red_ and _white_ and _couples_. Well, there was only one thing in that category I didn't remotely hate, at least, every other day of the year. Oh, the joy of knowing that David hated this day as much as me.

I walked through the thin layer of snow to my now-white Smartcar. I opened the passenger door to get the brush from under the seat. When I closed the door, the snow slid off, and I froze.

"My _car_ is _red_," I said calmly, freaking out inside. "My car is red. _My_ car _is_ red." I dropped the brush and screamed, "_MY CAR IS RED_!!!!!"

I ran back inside and into the kitchen. I called Mom's cell phone, and she answered on the first ring.

"Good morning," she said happily. "Happy V-Day."

"MY CAR IS RED!" I yelled. "WHY IS MY CAR RED?"

"Your car is yellow, Jane."

I rolled my eyes, really starting to panic. "I just closed the door, and a bunch of snow fell off, and my car is _red_!"

Mom laughed. "I can't do anything about that, kiddo. Just deal with it, and we'll get it re-painted later."

"Fine," I grumbled, hanging up the phone before she could reply.

I walked sulkily to my car and brushed the rest of the snow off. I scowled at its redness, wondering who could do such a thing to me, and if this really _was_ my car. The key fit in the ignition, and I was ready to cry.

An envelope was sitting behind the steering wheel, mocking me. I opened it and read the letter, reminding myself to kick somebody when I got to school.

_Haha,_ the note said. _You suck! Happy Valentine's Day, hope you hate it as much as everyone else!_ I rolled my eyes at the signature. _Love always – because this is how vampires do it – Ness & Co._

__________

"Very funny," I growled. Renesmee was grinning ear to ear as she took in my red car and redder face. I handed her the envelope, and she tucked it in her bag with a look of triumph.

"I thought so," Ness said, looking around for the rest of our group. "Are they ditching today? I know it's the worst day to be around people, but still."

I shrugged, still really irritated. I knew it was just a joke, but I was worried about April Fool's Day, which was approaching fast.

"Fool," I said with a sigh. "I forgot to feed the bird! Oh well, he can live off his stick of butter."

"You give your bird a stick of butter?" Holly asked from behind me. "Happy Hell Day."

"Thanks," I muttered, turning around. Everybody was coming, except Thing One and Thing Two, who had other matters to attend to in the morning, and didn't know why we had inherited five other people, and were with their relatively new boyfriends most of the time anyway.

There were complaints all around as we took in some of the disgusting couples that were suddenly obsessed with each other.

"Aren't you glad Jane and David aren't like that?" Renesmee sighed, shaking her head at another clingy pair. "This is probably the most disgusting day of the year. And Halloween was pretty intense."

The image of the amazingly decorated school gym passed through my mind, and I laughed at the memory of seeing Edward, Bella, and Renesmee walking around with plastic fangs.

"Yes, that was very funny," David said, apparently thinking the same as me. He smiled down at me. I took his hand and held it up.

"See, this is how you do it," Renesmee called, modelling our gloves, and the fact that our skin wasn't touching. My worst enemy, who went by the name of Alex Sabonett, scowled at us and made a show of kissing her boyfriend, who happily went along. Our group was very well synchronized, and we all flipped her off at the same time, laughing when she "gasped" and made an overdramatic exit.

"Dumb blonde," Holly muttered, untying her ponytail and letting her own light hair fall behind her. I really liked her highlights – light to dark brown that made her hair look longer. It fell all the way down her back – just as long as Renesmee's, which was curly, and therefore, longer.

Ness clapped her hands together and turned to face us all. "Are we ready for a horrible day?" she asked excitedly.

"Yes!" we cheered.

"Anybody want to ditch?"

"Yes!"

"And – hold that thought." She pulled a tiny cell phone from her inside coat pocket and read the message she had just received. "Okay, no ditching, says Dad!"

__________

"Really?" Jessie complained as we stepped into the cafeteria. "Is it _necessary_ for every couple to have their own table?"

It was true – most of the tables were held by two people, who were paying no attention to their food, and more to each other. The sane people, the single ones, all banded together in _our_ corner, and were looking at the rest of the students like they were about to vomit.

"Outside?" Eric suggested. I knew he had looked to Holly for approval.

"Just get me out of here," Holly said, nearly running through the room to the other set of doors, which led to the cold picnic tables. The rest of us followed quickly, removing the new tarps from all the tables and pushing them together. We split into two sides of the tables: Galen, Renesmee, David, and me on one side, and Holly, Alex, Jessie, and Eric on the other. There were only two "official" couples in our group: me and David, and Jessie and Eric. I mused on the idea of Holly and Alex, but it didn't really fit. Renesmee and Galen sure worked, though.

_No evil thoughts,_ I told myself as I brought out my lunchbox. The other six took theirs out at different times, and Renesmee stated that her family was going hunting tonight.

Every time she said something like that, Galen started asking a string of questions that she willingly answered. They sat really close together, and it looked like Ness looked at him for support when certain questions came up.

I tapped David's shoulder, and he leaned in to listen to my whisper. "Do you think he's more interested in her, or her life?"

David smirked and said, "Her. Definitely her."


	21. Chapter 21

_**Renesmee**_

_That_ day passed faster than I could ever have dreamed. It felt that as soon as it started, it ended. _Oh, the almost-joy of being almost-free,_ I thought as I put on my light boots, so I could run easier. I jumped into the new snow, feeling it melt under me. It melted through the bottom of my jeans, but it didn't weigh me down.

One foot of snow made so much difference when running. I kicked up puffs as I sprinted to the river where the rest of my family was waiting.

"That took long," Alice said. Jacob – as a wolf – sat down beside me, and I pet the top of his head.

"I had to pee," I told her fearlessly. "You should've seen that coming."

She grinned and shrugged, taking two steps and jumping over the river.

"Can we split up?" I asked.

"Why?" Dad, Alice, and Mom asked. Jacob looked at me like he was asking too.

I shrugged. "I want to? I don't know, just this gut feeling that it will be better."

Jasper laughed and followed Alice across. "It's a hunt," he called, "why should it matter?"

"I don't know," I repeated, following Mom and Dad across. I barely realized that the last four were already gone. Jacob tensed and jumped across, and stood beside me, waiting.

I looked around, finding the path less traveled. "That way." I pointed to my left, and Jacob trotted in front of me impatiently. I rolled my eyes and ran past him. We outran each other for a while before we decided we should just go.

The moon was full, and the scene mirrored another hunt I had put on paper in September – except with snow.

We stopped in a small clearing pretty far into the forest, and I scanned my surroundings. I spotted a smallish mountain lion, slinking around in a tree on the other side of the meadow.

"What are _you_ doing here?" I mumbled, nodding towards it. Jacob nodded and started forward quickly. "_Mine_," I said.

The wolf nodded again, and I passed him, moving in silently. I jumped into a nearby tree and tensed to spring as the lion sprawled lazily on its branch.

Jacob stood under the lion's tree and watched as I hopped onto the next branch.

_Stalking gets boring after a while,_ I thought, jumping on the cat.

__________

"Good hunt?" was the first thing I heard when I got to school the next morning.

I kept walking, my boots scrunching on the ground as I made my way to the benches. "It was very fine, Galen, thank you for asking."

"So it went well," he said, sitting down across from me. His light brown hair was a little wet, and I guessed someone had thrown a snowball at him earlier. His dark eyes were bright, and I smiled at his apparent happiness.

The first bell rang, and I wondered where everybody was. I was really confused when I saw people _leaving_.

"It's flu week," Galen pointed out. "Half the school is out hacking their guts out – including teachers." He smirked.

I looked at him suspiciously, but playfully. "What does that mean?"

He laughed and said, "We have the day off. You didn't need to come."

"You were serious about _half the school_ being out? We can leave? And, how did you find out anyway?"

He nodded and stood up, walking around the table and pulling me out of my seat. "Facebook. Where do you want to go today? Unless you want to go _home_, but where's the fun in _that_?"

I shrugged, and walked beside him to the nearly empty parking lot. "We have a wide collection of musical instruments, albums, books, video game systems, and a fifty-inch television. Other than that, nothing. Is there nobody we can visit?"

He shook his head and stopped in front of my Beetle. "Nobody cool. You're gonna have to drive, 'cause there's _no way_ I'm walking home."

I looked down, and realized the snow was deeper than it was last night. "This is the first time I've seen this much snow," I said, taking a step back and gathering some up in my hands.

"Same here," Galen said, turning around just in time to get a snowball in the face.

I laughed and ran away as he threw one at me. I hid on the on the other side of my car, sticking my tongue out when he looked through the windows.

"That's cheating," he said, throwing one over the car that missed me by a mile.

"Screw you," I laughed, beating him with my own pile of snowballs.

He ducked on the other side, and I dropped to my stomach to see under the car. There was nothing there, except footprints spreading to both sides.

I stood up and gasped when it hit me right in the back of the neck. "That's – _cold_. Really, really cold," I whispered, shaking snow out of my hair as Galen moved to stand in front of me.

"It's snow. It's _going_ to be cold." He rolled his eyes and leaned against the Beetle, waiting.

"It's colder on _me_," I told him, rolling my own eyes. "I'm really warm, remember?"

Galen nodded and pulled my hands away from my hair, placing them at my sides. I just stood there, expecting something other than what was coming.

"I declare a snow war," he said.

My head tilted to the side and my mouth popped open with an expression of, _Huh?_ "What's that about?" I asked, more than a little confused.

"Snow war," he repeated, flipping open his cell phone and logging onto that stupid website called Facebook. He looked up from the page and said, "It's like a snowball fight, except with teams."

I let out an exasperated sigh. "Well, I assumed that. I just – never mind."

He shrugged. "Okay." He typed something into a little rectangle and turned the phone towards me so I could read it.

"'Galen Westlake and Renesmee Cullen declare a snow war at FHS.' Who said I had anything to do with it?"

"Me," he said, entering the status.

__________

I gawked at the flood of cars into the parking lot. Ten minutes hadn't passed, and there were already twenty people there, helping build up a long wall that separated the small field into two equal parts.

"You have _got_ to be kidding me," I muttered as Miss McCartney and Miss McCartney pulled into the lot in a blue Sebring. They got out and walked together, looking comfortable and prepared for a "snow war" with students.

"No joke," Galen said matter-of-factly, tallying three new people. "They're regulars."

"_Regulars_?" He just nodded. I waited for an answer, but I knew I wasn't getting one. "Well, okay. So, how many do we have?" I looked over his shoulder and counted the ticks on his clipboard, looking around to confirm the number. "Fifty-seven? Wow."

He shrugged and started numbering people off into two teams, putting best friends and siblings against each other. Miss McCartney glared at Miss McCartney from across the field, and they both burst into laughter.

"The rules remain the same," Galen called. "No friendly fire, no stealing from the other team. The first Doctor for each team is the leader, and the job can be passed on. The team that surrenders loses." That seemed to be the queue to start, because everybody charged forward at the same time.


	22. Chapter 22

_**Jane**_

I lounged on the couch with nothing to do. Half the school was out with the flu – I knew that. But the other half had to be doing _something_.

"Are you sure you don't want a ride anywhere?" Dad asked again, digging through the box of old movies. "I'll drive you. I'm just as bored as you are."

There was no doubt – he was _just as bored_ as I was. You could tell he was bored when he insisted on doing something – sifting through movies, cleaning out the fridge, et cetera. He always had to be doing something, or he would get annoyed with everything. Unlike me – I could sit there and let my brain melt.

"I have nothing to do, nowhere to go, and no one to come with me if I were to go somewhere. My friends are either too sick to talk or not answering." On a last impulse, I opened the laptop again and went online.

"Nothing interesting, right?" Dad said.

I shook my head slowly. "Not really.... People saying how sick they are, people saying how bored they are..." I scrolled down the page a little bit. "_SNOW WAR_!" I yelled, slamming the computer shut. "Can you drive me to school?"

Dad eagerly shoved the box away and picked up his keys from the table. I pulled our coats out of the closet near the door, tossing his to him. We were perfectly synchronized – like a lot of Canadians.

We practically ran outside, and I slid down the driveway, past my half-buried, again-yellow Smartcar and clinging onto the side-view mirror on Dad's grey Honda Accent.

"Be nice to my car," he scolded me as I opened the door carefully, tapping the snow off my boots.

"I _am_ nice to your car," I replied as Dad pulled out of the driveway. "I'm just nicer to mine."

__________

He pulled into the school's parking lot, and my heart broke when I saw that they had started without me. I jumped out as soon as he stopped, telling him I would call him later.

I ran into the battlefield, laughing as I was pelted by snowballs. "Where am I?" I yelled.

"Here!" Ness shouted from my right. She threw a snowball past me, and I watched it hit Galen in the back of the head. I ducked under the wall, packing snow together immediately and wailing it across the field, grinning when it hit Miss Art McCartney, and she turned to me.

"That's for the three-minus on the paint project!" I laughed.

She smiled and threw one that hit my shoulder. "_That's_ for writing it into a three-plus before you returned it!"

I grinned and moved back to kneel beside Renesmee. "So, who's all here that we like?"

She threw another snowball that met the back of Miss Music McCartney's head before it could hit someone on the other team. "Sorry!" Ness called. Then she turned to me. "Um, just me and Galen and the McCartney twins, I think." She shrugged.

I nodded, throwing a snowball across the field. It went way too high and hit one of the school buildings.

"Your aim really sucks!" Galen yelled from somewhere on the other side of the wall. I couldn't see him for all the flying snow.

"_You_ suck!" I called back, wherever he was.

"Yeah, whatever," he said. "Hey Ness!"

A snowball flew, and Renesmee dodged it skilfully. "Hold it, incoming text!"

I stood up and screamed, "_TIMEOUT_!"

Everybody froze, and Ness took out her little phone, reading the message. She stood up and looked for Galen. "Sidelines," she said.

Galen stood up, and they met outside the field.

"Let's go," I said, and the war started again.

__________

"There's no winner?" Ness asked, looking a little annoyed. "What was the point of two hours of pelting if nobody wins?" Her face was redder than usual, from all the cold snow hitting her face. She took off her gloves, and her fingers looked pink and numb.

Galen laughed, looking happier than he normally did. He put his arm around her shoulders like they were old friends. "They point, dear hybrid, is that you let everything out of your system, and you got to hit people with snow." He took Renesmee's gloves and shook them over her head so some more snow fell onto her hair. She took a step back and retrieved her gloves.

I pointed to both of them. "You two like, buddy-buddy now?"

They shrugged at the same time. "So, Alice saw something, and she sent me a message telling me where I would be in ten minutes," Ness said nonchalantly.

I gave her the look that said, _Well, yeah_. "And where did she saw you would be in ten minutes?" I asked.

Renesmee smiled, looking a little shy, and said, "With Galen."

It took me a second to realize what she meant, and then I felt my mouth open and saw the word, "Ohh."

A left-behind snowball flew across the field, and a second, lighter war began, with only twenty-ish people fighting.

"Hey, I've got no complaints," Galen said. "It took _me_ a second to realize what she meant, too."

I clapped slowly. "But yeah, I'm happy. I think. I don't know."

Renesmee laughed and walked slowly to the benches a few feet away. She looked thoughtful, as if she was thinking about the future. _She probably is,_ I thought with a shudder.

I sat down on her left, and Galen sat down on her right. She set her phone on the table, and all three of us looked at it.

_Hold them up, we'll be there soon._

"Hold _who_ up, exactly?" I whispered.

She shook her head. "I don't know," she replied quietly. "That's the only thing it says, so I'm really wondering what it's about."

I nodded slowly, looking up for no apparent reason. Ness put her phone away. She and Galen followed my gaze, looking to the forest, which looked darker than it should have.

"You see something dark in there, right?" I mumbled, my mouth barely moving. "Because I _know_ there's something there."

Galen nodded slowly, and Renesmee suddenly looked pale. She stood up slowly and moved around the table, still watching that same spot.

"Game over," she said calmly to the people in the snow fight. "Get out of here, now." They all stopped, and started to walk away. Whatever that dark spot was, it moved a tiny bit closer.

"Oh my god," I breathed, seeing two dark figures now, one quite a bit shorter than the other one. I looked at Galen, but he was as white as the snow, and definitely not saying a word. His eyes were wide, and there was a small look of recognition on his face.

Those people weren't leaving fast enough. I moved away from the table, pulling Galen with me.

"Hurry up," Renesmee said sternly. The people who hadn't left the field yet started walking faster.

"_Run_!" I screamed, and the two figures came out of the trees.


	23. Chapter 23

_**Renesmee**_

Jane screamed, and they finally started moving at a good pace. A few of them looked back, and when they saw Caius and Jane, they _knew_ to run.

_Where are you?_ I thought, not wanting to look away.

"Right here," Rosalie whispered behind me, putting her hand on my back. "We're all here, except Carlisle and Esme. They're with the other four humans."

I nodded, motioning for Galen and Jane to come here, _now_. They came quickly and stood on either side of me. I felt Galen's cool hand grab mine, and I took Jane's hand too.

"You're not leaving me," I said to both of them. "I won't let anything happen."

Caius scowled at us – which was, apparently, an expression glued to his face now. Jane looked pleased, and that terrified me. I felt Mom's shield envelope me, but it didn't shake the bad feeling.

There was a long silence, and I started to feel on edge. We just stood there and stared at Caius and Jane, waiting.

"_What_?" Dad asked, so quietly, I knew Caius and Jane couldn't hear. I turned around, and saw that Mom looked more terrified than I felt.

"I can't cover him," she breathed. "I can't."

I felt my eyes widen and I snapped around to look at Galen. He looked like he was going to be sick, and I was ready to cry. I turned slowly towards Jane – _that_ Jane, not my Jane. She was looking past me – probably at Mom. Then she looked at me, and I felt a little poke in the air around my stomach.

_No, no, please don't, please..._

Her eyes slowly moved to Galen. She smiled.

He fell straight down, clutching his sides like he was trying to hold himself together. His eyes and mouth were shut tight, and he was twitching painfully. I could only fall beside him, looking at the bad Jane.

"_Stop it_!" I yelled.

Jane's smile got bigger, and Galen gasped. "I don't think I will," she said lightly. "Having trouble there, Bella?" She laughed evilly, and Caius smirked.

Mom hissed, and Dad grabbed her arms, holding her where she was.

I stood up and walked briskly towards Jane and Caius, who stood there coolly, worried about nothing. I imagined the feeling – not just the non-sight, but the _feeling_ of being unconscious and awake. With all the force I could build, I threw it at Jane in the second that I slapped her across the face.

Her eyes went blank, and she dropped to the ground like a doll. I turned to see that Galen had stopped twitching, and I felt tears flood my eyes. He was unconscious, but alive.

Everything happened quickly. Our Jane dropped to her knees and made sure Galen was okay. Caius gawked at me and Jane – his Jane – and three from our side jumped on him and pinned him to the ground. Mom, Alice, and Rosalie ran to Jane, to make sure she couldn't do anything when – or if – she woke up.

Caius struggled to get free. I wondered if I could knock _him_ out, around three other vampires, who were probably thinking about taking him apart. He grabbed my ankle, and I fell on my face with a cough.

I thought of that same feeling again and turned around to hit his hand, which was pulling me towards him. I tapped it lightly, he stopped moving, and I fell forward, clutching my head.

"Are you okay?" our Jane called to me.

I nodded, holding my head together. I knew it wouldn't literally split open, but figuratively, it was already there.

I whimpered, ready to pass out myself any second. My head just _wouldn't let me_. "Make it stop," I whined. "No more..."

"Can somebody free themselves and _help_?" Jane yelled.

My eyes were closed, but I could still see the little white specks that old me I was going to pass out. _Hurry up,_ I thought, and the pounding finally receded.

__________

My eyes opened slowly, seeing the same amount of darkness as they did when they were closed. I sat up with my hand on my forehead, hearing loud nothing – that deep sound you can't explain, the one that drowns out everything else.

"Hello?" I whispered, but I couldn't hear it for the sound of nothing. I looked around, waiting for my eyes to adjust. _Oh, this can't be good,_ I thought. "Is anybody else here?" The strange tingling inside my head seemed to spread down to my feet, telling me I was still half-out. I felt around carefully, trying to find something that would tell me _where_ I was.

I was sitting on a big, comfortable mattress, half-covered by an even bigger blanket that was just as comfortable, and warm and thick. There was a puffy pillow behind me. _Well, this is weird._

Something cold touched my toes at the other side of the mattress, and I pulled them close to the rest of me. _It was your other foot, stupid,_ my Voice of Reason scolded me.

I looked up and out just in time to see the moon break from behind a cloud.

The room was illuminated by the light, and I almost laughed at my seriousness. I was in _my_ room – in the big house. The mattress I was on lay right on the floor, right where I put it. I liked having a low bed, and this was as low as it could get.

It used to be Dad's room. I changed it around a little bit, painting the walls behind the sheets silver, instead of having a bunch of different shades of gold. I had the two middle windows changed to sliding doors.

The first thing I did was stumble over to the doors. I fumbled with the handle, and pulled them open a few inches. A light breeze flew in, clearing my head and my ears. I turned around, looking at the mattress from a different view.

_Mattress_es_,_ I corrected myself, seeing the two king-size squares laying side-by-side. I had the feeling I knew why the other one was there, but I had to make sure, didn't I?

I flipped that comforter over, and raised my eyebrows when I saw nothing underneath. I pulled mine away, and there was still nothing there.

"What the crap...?" I muttered, looking around the room and finding nobody.

My clock was sitting beside my mattress slash bed, face-up. The dark blue numbers shined off the ceiling, and I read the time backwards.

_A quarter after five,_ I counted, looking out the window again. The horizon was slowly getting lighter, and I frowned. _I'm late for my own run._

I walked quickly to the door, trying to get back to my regular routine. I usually woke up just before five, got ready, and went for a vampire-paced run in the forest before I came back in time to get ready and go to school. Being fifteen minutes late really messed that up.

I paused, looking at the leaf-shaped calendar on my door. Somebody else had marked off the dates, because there were two little checks that were not written by me.

"_Two days_?" I said to myself, shaking my head. "Jeez." I checked off what had to be today, the first Sunday of March, and opened the door. There was nobody in the dark hall, so I flitted down the stairs. "Any living people down here?" I asked.

"I'm living," Alice called, sticking her head out of the kitchen doorway.

I laughed lightly. "You know what I mean."

She shrugged and said, "He's in here." She disappeared into the room.

"_That_ is what I meant," I said, ditching the plans for my morning run and walking into the kitchen with an impish smile on my face.


	24. Chapter 24

_**Jane**_

I surrounded myself with colours. Every black thing from my closet was hastily thrown down the laundry chute in my eagerness to get it away from me. Everything white was allowed to stay, but if I saw one thing that was red, it was gone.

The Fool on the Hill chirped and perched in his box in the farthest corner in my room, taking a careless poop.

Something touched my arm, and I jumped.

"Jeez, calm down," David muttered, pulling me to him. For the first time in half an hour, I looked around my large, square room. My tall double bed was right in the middle, under the big window. There was an end table on both sides of my bed, a bookcase and chair to the right of my bed, and a desk and chair featuring my laptop and phone, which were sitting there, mocking me.

Way across the room was my closet, and in that fair-sized walk-in closet was the laundry chute – the best thing in this entire house, apart from the food processor. Everything in my room was painted or decorated in a tropical theme or orange, green, and yellow – I even had a blow-up palm tree at the end of my bed, balancing inside a pile of foam coconuts.

I'd been sitting on my bed, staring at my laptop and phone, waiting for some sign. David sat beside me, looking at me and asking what was wrong.

"What's wrong?" I said, looking at him sharply. "Well, I was confronted by two evil vampires with red eyes and black cloaks. I was terrified enough to pass out, but I could only stand there and wait. The little evil girl attacked Galen – without touching him, if I have to add, and _he_ was unconscious – and Renesmee attacked _her_. The _vampire_ was knocked out cold, and the tall scary-looking guy vampire tried to hurt Renesmee, but she knocked _him_ out too. I barely remember anything after that, because I _finally_ passed out, and woke up _here_." I smacked the bed with my fist. "And I haven't heard a thing from Ness or Galen or _anybody_ for _two days_!" I fell back onto my bed, and the blankets made a light _poof_ noise under me.

David turned around to look at me worriedly. He spoke quietly, shielding his accent. "Maybe you should just stop thinking about it. You're fine, and they have to be fine. If they weren't, _somebody_ would have called you."

"_But_, if _none_ of them are fine, _none_ of them could call me!" I argued. "So where does that leave me?"

He rolled his eyes and fell down beside me. "Call them," he said calmly. "If you won't I will."

I looked for some other option and found none. "Okay, fine." I sat up and summoned the thin cordless phone, plopping back down sideways on my bed. I examined the little buttons thoughtfully and contemplated what would happen if nobody answered. The phone rang once, and I waited for the second.

"Hi, Jane," a light voice answered.

I froze, unsure of what to do. David smiled beside me and held me free hand, turning it over and pulling my fingers out of the fist they were making.

"Hi, Alice," I said quietly. "Um..."

"Everybody's okay," Alice told me with a laugh. "Don't worry about us."

"And –"

"Galen's fine too."

I nodded with a sigh of relief. "Okay. Well. Thanks, Alice."

Alice chuckled again. "No problem. See you later – today."

I smiled. "Thanks for the heads-up. Bye, then."

"Yep," Alice said.

I hung up the phone and let it roll towards my pillows. I turned to David. "Happy?" I asked.

He smiled, dropping my hand and putting his arm around my waist. "Quite happy," he said.

"Well, so am I," I said. "I'm glad you're feeling better."

David chuckled, and he sounded English again. He got up and grabbed his coat from the hanger behind my door.

"Where are you going?" I asked, confused.

He threw my coat to me and grinned. "_We_ are going to visit some vampires."

__________

I ran up the porch steps and knocked on the door repeatedly. David walked up behind me and waited silently – the complete opposite of my endless knocking. I looked to my right for no apparent reason, and I froze.

"_Please_ tell me there aren't cloaked people walking out of the forest a few hundred metres away," I whispered.

David turned, and his face went white. He quickly reached around me and opened the door, practically picking me up and carrying me in.

I looked around the room, expecting someone to say something. But they were all looking outside with scared eyes. I walked over to Renesmee, who was standing a little bit outside the group, staring outside.

She must have noticed I was there, because she said, "They have him."

The intense music picked up in my head as I saw one smaller figure in greys being carried like a sack of potatoes by someone in the back. I counted thirteen people – vampires – all wearing cloaks that ranged from grey to deep black, back to front.

The group stopped in the middle of the clearing, and the one carrying the human – I knew who it was, but couldn't bring myself to name him – moved forward and dropped him in front of the three figures wearing the darkest black, quickly moving back to the end.

"That's them, isn't it," I said, breaking a long silence. "The Volturi."

That set everyone off. They were out of the house before I could blink again. I saw them run out into the field to sand across from the other vampires.

"Come on," David said, grabbing my hand and pulling me away.

"I'm not leaving," I said strongly as David tried to lead me to my car. "I can't do that." He gaped at me, and looked out into the field. "Please," I said.

He let go of my hand, and I started walking towards the scene. I heard him follow me, and I walked faster.

_Did they _wait_ for us?_ I thought as I ran to stand beside Renesmee. She stared at the person – at Galen – and she looked like she had lost a war. I couldn't look at anything, so I kept my eyes on the ground in front of me. The snow was starting to melt, and it was soaking my feet.

Renesmee took a shaky breath and stepped forward, closer to the bad guys.

"Hello, Aro," she said calmly.

There was a strangely happy laugh across the field. "Renesmee, my child! Look how you've grown!" I assumed that was Aro answering, and I felt a small smile on my lips. "But, if I may ask, where are your puppies?"

"Oh, they're coming," Ness assured them. "They'll be here any second."

"Shall we wait for them to join us, then?" Aro asked.

I saw Ness shrug. "That would be fair. But, first, I would like my boyfriend back."


	25. Chapter 25

_**Renesmee**_

I took a couple more steps forward and crossed my arms. "And also, why did you only take _him_?" I hid the intense fear and worry from my face as I tried to look nonchalantly at Galen's unconscious body. He looked calm and unafraid, as if he was only asleep. _I really love him,_ I thought hopelessly.

Aro smiled like he always did. Marcus looked _blah_ and Caius looked relatively _pissed_. Then again, so did their Jane, who was giving me the death-stare.

"Nice to see you woke up," I said, nodding to them.

Caius scowled. "_This morning_," he growled. Jane hissed, and I held onto my calm state. _I can do _damage_,_ I realized.

"Back to our subject," I tried, turning back to Aro. "My question."

"It is not in happiness," Aro said, "that I tell you that they all have been, let's say, tended to."

I felt terror seep into every nerve in my body. Jane collapsed beside me, and it looked like David was having a hard time staying awake. I felt myself shaking, and the tears flowed through my eyes.

"That's disgusting," I gasped. "How could somebody _do_ something so vile? It's cruel... and pathetic."

I felt a hand on my shoulder and Mom whispered, "It's okay, we'll get him out of this."

My insides warmed again for a fraction of a second, and then froze again. "Is Galen okay?" I turned around, waiting for another reason to cry. Dad pursed his lips, and I choked out a sob. I spun back around and yelled, "What did you do to him?!"

Aro held up a hand, and I felt obligated to calm down. I thought he was going to say something, but Jane – their Jane – spoke instead.

"You left him _weak_," she said happily. "It didn't take a third of a second to knock him out. Who knows how long it will be this time?" She laughed, apparently proud of her acts.

_Maybe I'll just knock_ you_ out again,_ I wanted to say. I knew I couldn't, or it would start something _big_.

"So, what?" I muttered. "Do you want some kind of _exchange_? What can I give you, so you will give him back?"

Jane smirked and moved to stand in front of where Galen lay. She touched Aro's hand, and he motioned for them to retreat. "Let's see," she said, looking up and pretending to think. "What shall we exchange...?" She put her foot under Galen's back and pushed him over. I hissed, and she smiled.

"Shall we go?" Aro said quietly to the rest of them, leaving Jane to tease me in the field. "Return quickly," he said behind him.

Jane nodded, her eyes on me. She went to flip Galen over again, but it ended up more like she kicked him. She put her hand to her mouth and said, "Oops, my mistake!" She kicked him again, and I took a few more steps forward.

"Don't –touch – him," I said dangerously. Everything I saw was started to tint itself with red.

Jane faked a gasp and kicked him again. He was still unconscious, but his face told me he was in pain.

I was only a few large steps away from Jane and Galen. I tensed, waiting for her to push me off the edge of sanity. Everything was red.

"I said, _don't touch him_."

Jane smirked and raised her foot again. I lunged for her throat, knowing it wouldn't hurt her, but forcing her to the ground so she couldn't kick him again.

She dodged me – barely – and I felt an electric pain inside me, forcing me to crumple momentarily. Jane laughed, but she quickly cut herself off when I stood up and grabbed her throat, lifting her off the ground and ignoring the electricity gaining power.

"How many times do I have to tell you," I hissed, "before you get what I'm saying?" I threw her to the ground and stepped on her throat. "Would you like three days of nothing? Because I would _gladly_ gift it to you."

Jane pulled on my foot, throwing off my balance. I fell to the ground, and she pulled my arm behind me, threatening to break it.

_Stay away,_ I warned Dad, seeing them ready to run. _This is mine_.

Jane pulled a little, and I gasped. I rolled towards my arm, pulling her down. With all the force I could, I punched her in the face, remembering the feeling of unconsciousness.

She was pushed back by the hit, and pushed down by the darkness. She lay in a heap, and I returned the favour by kicking her five times in the stomach, watching with eager eyes as she bounced back every time.

I turned back to my family. David was trying to wake Jane, and I vaguely remembered why she had fainted. I looked directly at Dad and said, "Shoot."

They all ran forward at the same time, pulling Jane apart. I immediately went to Galen, unsure of what to do.

Alice came up behind me and said, "Let's take him inside."

I nodded, the fear and sadness falling down on me again. _All of them,_ I realized. _Holly, Eric, Jessie, Alex... all of them._ I stayed sitting on the grass as Alice carefully picked him up and disappeared towards the house. I fell onto the grass and let the grief crush me. I gasped for breath, rubbing my arm from fingertips to shoulder. I felt something wet near my waist on the left side, and I pulled my shirt up an inch to see a deep gash, and the blood slowly seeping from it.

I groaned and fell back to the ground, the shock finally catching up to me.

__________

As soon as I was awake, guilt flattened me past the floor. It was my fault. My fault everything happened. My fault Alex is dead. My fault Jessie is dead. My fault Eric is dead. My fault Holly is dead.

My fault Galen was almost dead.

I started crying before I was fully awake, hugging my pillow and wishing everything would just go away. I traced everything back to its roots, deciding that my going to school was the reason all this crap happened.

And it was. If I had never have gone to school, I would never have met Jane, she would never have met us, nobody would have had suspicions, our secret would still be a secret, and we wouldn't have been here.

_But,_ a little voice reminded me, _you also would never have friends like this. You would never have Galen._

But life would still be normal.

_There is nothing normal about life._

For the first time in a while, I agreed. Life _isn't_ normal. I _need_ these people.


	26. Chapter 26

_**Jane**_

I kept my eyes shut because I _really_ didn't want to see the scene around me. It was quiet, yeah, but I just wanted to go home.

_I can't believe them. They killed my friends. They were going to kill Galen. _

_They were going to kill _us_._

There was no way I could resist anymore. The silence was too... _silent_. I opened my eyes, and then snapped them shut.

_White room,_ I thought. _Oh crap. Maybe they did kill us. _But... it looked familiar – at least, what I barely saw of it looked familiar.

I let my eyes open again, and I breathed a light sigh of relief. I wasn't dead – nowhere close – I was in the living room. I remembered waking up here the last time I passed out. Which was here.

I sat up without a problem. I felt well-rested, like I usually did when I woke up – after sleeping, and after knocking myself out.

"Anybody home?" I called in normal tones. Of course they could hear me, if anybody _was_ here.

"I'm home," Ness said from somewhere above me. The only logical place was the big staircase – I looked to see her sitting near the top of the stairs, looking like she'd been there for a while. "Galen is here too. He's okay, just so you know. I, sadly, am not."

She stood up and perched on the banister, letting herself slide down smoothly. When she stepped onto the floor down here, she winced.

"What happened?" I asked, standing up too quickly. I swayed and sat back down. "Okay, apparently I'm not coming over there."

Ness smiled warmly and walked towards the kitchen, sticking her head in the doorway. She turned back to me and said, "Jane – not you Jane, the other Jane – got on my last nerve. So, I attacked her." I blinked, and she grinned. "We don't have to worry about her anymore. And, they're never coming back. _Apparently_, I'm scary."

I looked her over, wondering how she could be terrifying at all. Her eyes were too kind, her long hair looked like something that could get in the way easily in a fight, and, besides, she looked too _small_ to even _want_ to fight anyone. The thought in the back of my mind jumped forward, and I remembered how she had knocked those two vampires unconscious for, apparently, two and a half days.

"Terrifying," I said for no reason. "So, what makes you _not okay_? Other than... the obvious." It would hurt way too much to mention exactly what I was thinking.

"Oh, right," she said, walking over to me. She pulled up the left side of her pyjama shirt a couple inches, revealing a very not pretty cut. Well, it qualified as more than a cut, but it was the only word I could place. It was a little bit rounded, almost two inches long, and it looked really deep. There were purple stitches holding it together, and it looked like it would heal very slowly.

"Ouch," was all I could say about it. "You're saying Jane did that to you?"

She shrugged, leaving it the way it was. "She was attacking Galen – physically – and she started attacking me – mentally – and I didn't even _think_. I guess Mom let her shield down, because it _hurt_. First and last time, I swear." She shuddered and sat down beside me, being careful of the wound. "Yes, I think she did that. I don't _know_, but it only makes sense."

_Nothing makes sense anymore,_ I thought sadly.

__________

It took less than a day for all the snow to disappear and for Forks to return to its rainy state. The depressing weather seemed to hang over us, reminding us of everything that had happened.

School had changed. Every class felt longer and plainer than the last. Lunch was silent all around the cafeteria. The sun refused to shine on us. Everything was dark.

I made my way to the cafeteria alone, hoping for some change in scenery that made life a little more worth living.

I was more than puzzled when I saw a small crowd around our table – _not tables,_ I remembered sadly – and the cafeteria buzzing. I made my way there slowly, wondering what the party was about.

There were boxes and bags of every colour on the table, and I felt the lovely spark of recognition when I realized it was Galen's birthday. My subconscious had packed his gift in the bottom of my bag ten minutes before I left for school. Nobody would be surprised to see a palm tree like the one in my room – it was always the first birthday present I gave someone. And, as far as I could see, every person had kept theirs. David's was almost thirteen years old, and it still looked brand new.

I sat down in my regular spot, aware that nobody else was at the table. Everybody just knew it was ours, and the bags and boxes were placed in front of an empty seat. As soon as I put my schoolbag on the table, the group of present-protectors split, leaving me to guard them all. There had to be _at least_ fifty there, each from one group of friends.

The other three came rushing in, sitting in their usual spots. Galen looked at the table, perplexed.

"Yeah, they're for you," I said, gesturing to all of them. "But, first, you get mine."

"Tree," David muttered, and I stuck my tongue out. I yanked the folded-up tree from my bag and tossed it to Galen.

"It's the highest honour you get," I told him. "It's also the first birthday present I give a friend. So, there, you know we're friends."

Galen smiled – something I was always happy to see, since almost nobody else did – and moved on to the other gifts, thanking each person or group personally.

__________

Lunch was half over, and he was on the last box. It was small and not wrapped, the lid held closed by a small piece of wax. He pulled it apart and pulled out a folded piece of paper.

"How eerie," Renesmee said, looking at it dazedly. "What does it say?"

Galen shrugged and opened the paper. His eyes moved across the page, looking more confused by the second. When he got to the last line, he smiled again, and passed it on to Renesmee. She read it quickly and passed it to me.

_To all of you who live in Forks: You might not know, but there is going to be a meeting, of sorts, in the biggest lot in town, also known as the Thriftway parking lot, at 4PM. You will be discussing the disappearances of four students from Forks High School, as well as other details. It is very important that everybody attend. By the way, happy birthday Galen Westlake. Love, Alice._

I had to laugh. "Is Alice stalking us?" I asked nobody.

Renesmee shrugged. "Probably. She can see every decision we make, so I wouldn't doubt it."

I passed it on to David, who announced the "meeting". The cafeteria swelled with a synchronized, "Got it!"

"Good," I said. "Now all we have to do is make it through today."


	27. Chapter 27

_**Renesmee**_

The whole town was here – all thirty-two hundred. Cars were parked around the lot, down the streets, taking up as much space as possible. People were standing on the pavement, leaning against railings, and conveniently sitting on their own lawn chairs – like us.

We all stood at the very front in an apparently thought-out order: Carlisle, Esme, Emmett, Rosalie, Alice, Jasper, Mom, Dad, Jacob, me, Galen, David, Jane, and the wolves. Gramps – better known as Charlie – was sitting with the rest of the cops and Sam Uley, down the line a bit. We were quiet, and they were quiet. For a while.

"Can you tell us why we're here?" somebody called. "I'm sure we would like it if you kept looking for those kids."

There were murmurs of agreement and disappointment. Sam stood up and they stopped. He spoke into a microphone, so people at the back could hear through big speakers. "We aren't the only ones looking for them – everybody in this entire state is searching. This is important. This is mostly about the world as you know it."

My fluttery heart almost stopped beating when he said _as you know it_. Not _we_ – _you_.

_Oh my god,_ I thought, _this is going to change the world._

"Could you elaborate?" Jane's mom asked from a few feet behind us.

I was twitching in anticipation of what was coming. _Be prepared,_ I told myself. For the first time in a while, I looked at my bracelet.

"You may think you know what happens here," Sam said. "There are many explanations for things that happen to the world. No matter how close you may get, none of you are always right." I looked up, terrified. Sam looked directly at me. "But I'm not the one who should explain all of this. There are more people to count on." He waved me up, and I stood obediently. Planning what I would say, I walked up to stand beside him. He looked down at me, and I looked up at him. "This is Renesmee Cullen."

He handed me the microphone, and I took it in shaking hands. _I'm going to change the world,_ I thought. _I'm going to fix it._

I calmed right down and thought about how important this was. This moment, right here, right now.

"The history books tell us of plagues and infamous killings," I started, looking at the ground. "They tell us the world is the way it is. They are also wrong."

People spoke in the audience, and I quickly gained confidence. I looked up, now talking to everyone.

"There is a certain government in this world that you don't know about," I said. "They are called the Volturi. They are the ones that keep this world in one piece, and they will go to horrible measures to do it. They will kill innocent people, because they are so hell-bent on keeping our secrets contained.

"Holly, Alex, Jessie, and Eric were innocent people who knew this secret. They weren't runaways, and they weren't kidnapped. They were killed because they knew something that the Volturi didn't want them to know." I didn't pause to let it sink in – I continued smoothly.

"We are everywhere. We are your friends, your enemies, your teachers, your doctors... The list goes on infinitely. You may think you control this planet, but the truth is, we do.

"We are known around the globe. We take different names everywhere we go. There are different stories and legends about us. We are the mystics." I looked to my vampire family and my shapeshifter friends. "Jacob Black, Leah Clearwater, Seth Clearwater. Carlisle Cullen, Bella Cullen, Edward Cullen. You know them, don't you?"

The six came up and stood on either side of me. The audience looked up at us with expressions of wonder, confusion, and irritation.

"Of course you know them," I said. "Carlisle is your favourite doctor. That's hard to forget." I looked to the sky, at the thinning clouds. The sun was a light circle behind them, and I knew it was only a matter of time. "Take this calmly. My friends over here, they're from La Push." I looked to the wolves. "Their legends say that they are descended from wolves. Can we prove that?" I asked the town.

"No," some said.

I shook my head and turned back to the wolves. "Sure we can." I held my hand out, and they all phased on queue. One second, three people were standing beside me. The next, three wolves were beside me, grey, sand, and russet, standing over heaps of clothing. I heard gasps all around, and saw a bunch of people faint in the audience.

"You know them!" I called. "You never noticed them! And here they are, impossibly! Are you scared of them?"

I heard people shout that they were, and that they weren't. Nobody blew up. I looked to the sky again, and motioned for the rest of the vampires to come up.

Three wolves stood on my left, and eight vampires stood on my right.

"You know these people, too!" I said, looking at my family. "You know you like them! You legends tell you to fear them, fear us, but we aren't killers. We hunt animals."

The sun broke through, and I felt triumphant to see my family sparkle like diamonds. More people gasped and fainted, but most stared. I felt myself warm under the light of the sun, and I saw my skin glowing.

"We are vampires!" I announced. "And you're not afraid of us. You're amazed by us. We are unreal, but we live. Gold eyes are nothing to be intimidated by. We will not hunt you."

There was a dazed silence in the lot, and I took a deep breath. "We have lived together in secrecy. We know everything about you, but you know nothing about us. Why can't the world be without secrets? Why can't we live together without fear? Why can't we love a different kind of person? Why not."

My speech was over, and I nearly fell over backwards when the lot erupted with cheering and applause. I grinned at everybody, the people behind me, beside me, in front of me. I flicked the switch on the microphone and set it on the ground as people rushed forward to us.

I found myself in a mass of people, friends and strangers, even people I didn't particularly like. I pulled my way towards Charlie and hugged him tightly.

"Good job, kid," he said, moving on to the wolves.

Jane and David fought their way to me, and Jane jumped on me. David gave me a high-five.

"You were amazing!" Jane cried, her eyes flooding with tears.

"I think she knows," David said, smiling at me. "You were great, though."

"Thanks," I said, looking around as they made their way through the crowd.

There was noise all around me, and I could barely move with people randomly hugging me and congratulating me.

It took a few minutes, but I finally found who I was looking for. Galen pulled me out of the crowd with a huge smile on his face. His dark eyes were brighter than I had ever seen.

"Happy birthday," I told him. I looked to the crowd, barely noticing how many people were there.

"Thank you," he said, pulling me closer. "And congratulations to you."

"Thanks," I said with a laugh. I looked up at him. "You know, many people get half-birthday presents, too."

"Of course, how could I forget?"

More cheering erupted from the crowd as Galen kissed me.


End file.
